ear 




Class. 
Book. 



TJC/ 



Copyright^ . 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO 
ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 



THE 
MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



BEING A 

PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF THE RESULTS 

OF SCIENTIFIC CHILD-STUDY TO THE 

PROBLEMS OF THE FIRST YEAR 

OF CHILDHOOD 



BY 
MARION FOSTER WASHBURNE 

AUTHOR OF "FAMILY SECRETS," ETC. 



Nefo gorfe 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

1908 

All rights reserved 



UBHARYofGOfl 

Fwo copies Ke 

I 

5US* A AXc s to 
-2LO GS<i C 

30PY S. 



Copyright, 1908, 
By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 



Set up and electrotyped. Published May, 1908. 



Norfocotf $r*gg 

J. S. Cushing Co. — Berwick & Smith Co. 

Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. 



Co 

MY MOTHER 

Whose love and tender wisdom have followed me 

not only through the first years of my life 

but even through my adult years ; and, 

growing as I grew, have extended 

themselves to my children 



CONTENTS 



I. January 

The New-born Baby 

II. February 

One Month Old 

III. March 

Two Months Old . 

IV. April 

Three Months Old . 

V. May 

Four Months Old 

VI. June 

Five Months Old 

VII. July 

Six Months Old 

VIII. August 

Seven Months Old . 

IX. September 

Eight Months Old . 

X. October 

Nine Months Old 



PAGE 

I 



. 23 

• 41 

• 59 

. S6 
101 

. 118 

. 136 

. 151 



164 



V1U 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER 

XI. November 





Ten Months Old 


• • • • 


XII. 


December 






One Year Old . 


. 


XIII. 


Summary of the Year's 


Accomplishments 


Appendix 






Care of the Eyes of the New-born 


Index 







PAGE 
I84 



2IO 

230 

249 

255 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 








CHAPTER I 

JANUARY 

The New-born Baby 

In all the range of human experience there is 
nothing more transforming in its effect upon all 
those who are near at hand than the advent of a 
little baby — especially the first one. Yet, to 
unanointed eyes, what is he ? Just a little red, 
squirming thing, with eyes shut for the most 
part, with tight-clenched fists, with a toothless, 
sucking mouth, a hairless head, much too large 
for his body, — an impudent little thing who 
makes the whole adult household stand around, 
and imposes his own laws upon every one, 
regardless of their preferences ; a frail little thing, 
who has to be handled in ways so mysterious 
that the uninitiated flee from the attempt ; and 

B I 



2 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

only one of millions and millions of others, just 
like himself! 

This to the unanointed. To the mother 
whose eves have received the chrism from 
mighty Nature, he is one of the immortals, 
laid in her all-unworthy arms. She knows her- 
self a responsible human being, with one of 
God's children lent to her — a child for whose 
body, mind, and soul she is to render an 
account. 

PREPARATION 

Such a stupendous event requires full prepa- 
ration. Yet it sometimes happens that young 
mothers do not make anything like a sufficient 
preparation — largely because, being inexperi- 
enced, they do not know what is required. 
I know of one case in which the doctor was 
obliged to tear up new linen tablecloths and 
new r blankets to get the necessary supplies for 
the care of the baby and its voung mother. 
Always after that, one of the first things that 
he did when engaged to officiate on such an 
occasion was to inquire if there was plenty of 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 3 

old linen, cotton, and flannel in the house. 
When a nurse was also engaged, he would 
send her over, a month or two before the date 
on which the baby was expected, and have her 
make out, with the mother, a complete list of 
what was required. The list always included 
quantities of old, well-washed cotton and linen 
cloths, and squares of soft old flannel, 

BABY BASKET 

The baby basket should contain the following 
list of articles — none of them difficult or ex- 
pensive to provide, and all of them necessary: — 

A box of talcum powder. 

A bottle of boracic acid solution, 1 to 1 000. 

A jar of vaseline. 

A jar of lard — about half a pound. Or a flask of olive oil. 

A box of fine, pure soap. 

Three papers of safety pins, — medium, small, and large. 

Small squares of linen (old handkerchiefs) to serve as wash- 
cloths. 

Larger squares to serve as towels. 

Two large pieces (one yard square) of old flannel, one in 
which to receive the new-born baby, and one for the lap, when 
he is bathed. 



4 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

A bath thermometer. 

A complete set of the first clothes he is to wear. 
A spool of heavy white embroidery silk — or a skein — for 
tying the navel. 

A pair of sharp scissors for cutting the cord. 

The silk and scissors for the navel are usually 
carried by the physician, but it is well to have 
them on hand in case of an emergency. 

The use of all these things will appear later 
on when we describe the bathing and dressing 
of the baby. 

THE LAYETTE 

As for baby clothes, here is a list that will 
be found sufficient if the method of dressing 
presently to be outlined is followed. Of course, 
more may be added to it, if desired, but noth- 
ing can well be taken from it, and yet leave a 
list sufficient for the requirements of the baby. 



Dresses ...... 


6 


Stockinet under-garments . 


3 


Flannel skirts . . • . • 


3 


Nightgowns (flannel or flannelette) 


3 


Double-gowns . 


2 


Knit shirts, for wear at night . . . 


3 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 5 

Diapers ....... 5 dozen 

Long woolen stockings ..... 3 pairs 

Knit shawls or flannel squares ..... 2 

Cloak, hood, mittens, veil (the veil not white). 

Two or three of these items may require a 
word of explanation : You will notice that only- 
three under-garments are mentioned. That is 
because they are not worn at night ; and three 
permit a change twice a week, which is often 
enough for ordinary purposes. Since the long, 
fine, woolen stockings are expensive, three pairs 
will do. They may be easily washed out by 
hand, in case more changes are required. There 
are no white skirts, because they are really a 
useless luxury, adding to the laundry work, 
and detracting from the soft, cuddly feel of the 
baby, without adding anything to his charms. 

The little shirts for night wear are the cheap 
machine-knit ones, that go over the head. Of 
course, the baby should never wear at night 
the clothes he wears in the daytime. The little 
short shirt is less likely to get wet while the 
baby lies on his back in bed. A good plan 



6 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

for keeping the little shirt dry — for its lower 
edge often gets wet, otherwise, and is likely to 
give its wearer colic — is to wrap a thick nap- 
kin around the child's body, up to his armpits, 
under the shirt. It also serves to hold the shirt 
down, and is easily changed. 

NAPKINS 

The large quantity of napkins mentioned in 
the list is none too large. That is the one 
place where no one should economize. They 
may be made of old table napkins, sewed to- 
gether and quilted by the machine ; or of old 
tablecloths, treated in the same way ; or of 
cheap, sleazy cotton flannel — the cheaper and 
sleazier the better. But they should be at least 
a yard square, and so abundant that there is no 
danger of one of them ever being used twice, 
without a washing. They should be frequently 
changed, and washed out at once. No baby 
should be permitted to wait, in cold and damp 
and discomfort, for the leisure of mother or 
nurse; but should be attended to instantly. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 7 

There is some foolish superstition about a 
baby's never taking cold in its own wet, but 
that is, of course, not even a little bit true. It 
is worse to leave a baby with wet napkins on, 
around its middle, than to leave it in a wet 
dress, or to leave yourself in wet stockings — 
because not only is the damp where it does the 
most harm, but it is unclean and excoriating. 

NIGHT CARE 

Of course, these rules apply to the night as 
well as the day. It is troublesome to change 
a baby at night ; but not half so troublesome, 
after all, as to have a chafed and fretful and 
colicky baby. No one has ever counted the 
cases of colic that come from this careless habit 
of leaving babies for hours swathed in wet 
bandages, but it stands to reason that there 
must be many thousands. And who would 
not rather change a baby a dozen times a night, 
if necessary — only it never is ! — than to spend 
one night watching the poor little thing writhing 
in the agonies of colic ? 



8 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

BIRTJT 

" The entrance of the human being into life," 
says Perez, " is almost as painful as his exit from 
it." Not only is the labor of birth almost as 
exhausting to the new-born child, with his slight 
powers of endurance, as to the mother, but the 
conditions which he meets are in violent con- 
trast with those to which he has been accustomed. 
He must now do his own breathing and his own 
digesting — functions hitherto performed for him 
by the mother organism. All of his organs have 
to enter upon new relationships, necessitated by 
these two great changes. 

Furthermore, he is cold. Before birth, he 
lived in a constant temperature of 98. 6°. The 
warmest room that first receives him is not likely 
to be more than eighty — indeed, ought not to 
be, for the sake of the mother. A drop thus of 
eighteen degrees is a terrible change for his thin, 
sensitive skin. 

He should, then, be wrapped immediately in a 
large piece of thoroughly warmed flannel which 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 9 

has been kept toasting before the fire, awaiting 
his coming. Even in summer there should be 
some sort of a fire in the room in which he is to 
be washed and dressed, even though it be only 
an oil stove. All his clothes and napkins and 
towels should be there warming at least an hour 
before he needs them. 

FIRST BATH * 

Before being bathed he should be oiled all 
over. It is for this that the basket contains the 
jar of lard, or flask of olive oil. If he has much 
hair, that will need special attention. Wipe the 
oil off quickly with the squares of old linen in 
the basket. Of course, you will expose him to 
the air as little as possible during this operation. 
Let him lie on your knees before the fire in his 
warm flannel, and uncover only a little bit of him 
at a time. 

Then dip him swiftly into the warm water of 
the bath. Test it with your bath-thermometer, 
and see that it is just about ioo° — a trifle above 
* See Appendix: "Care of the Eyes of the New-Born." 



io THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

the temperature to which he has been accus- 
tomed. This bath is not really necessary, for 
the oil cleans the little body perfectly ; and some 
physicians object to it as a needless exposure and 
fatigue. In case the child is very weak, there- 
fore, or the labor has been unusually prolonged, 
the bath had better be omitted for a day or two. 
Otherwise, it may be given to please the dainti- 
ness of the mother, who naturally desires to see 
her baby as fresh and sweet as a little flower. 

As soon as the child has been bathed — and if 
he stops crying and stretches out his little legs and 
seems to enjoy the warmth and freedom, he may 
be suffered to remain in the tub for a couple of 
minutes — he should be lifted out and received im- 
mediately into a toasting warm towel. I have yet 
to see the baby cry upon leaving the bath if, before 
he fairly got his mouth puckered, he found himself 
pleasantly enveloped in a big warm towel. Have 
your lap covered, under the towel, with a piece 
of flannel equally large and warm. Roll the baby 
up in this and pat and cuddle him until he is dry. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK u 

FIRST CLOTHING 

Now to dress him : First anoint the cord with 
vaseline from your basket, then put over it a 
circle of old linen with a hole cut in the middle. 
The stump of the cord is put through this, and 
is thus prevented from coming in contact with 
the skin of the abdomen. This is all the navel 
dressing required. Anything more is harmful. 
Draw the knit band — warm, of course — over 
the legs and pin it if necessary, but not too 
tightly. Its whole object is to keep the navel 
dressing in place. The warm and powdered 
diaper goes on next, and the band is pinned to it. 
The little woolen stockings are gathered in the 
hand and slipped swiftly on — all before the 
upper part of the body is uncovered. The shirt 
comes next — warm, remember; and then the 
flannel gown, and the warm shawl. If each 
garment is thoroughly warm, the baby will not 
cry so desperately, for mixed with his discomfort 
will be recurring sensations of comfort. Warmth 
is the one great luxury and essential of the brand- 



12 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

new baby. He does not even need food so 
much as he does warmth for the first few days. 

CONDITION AT BIRTH 

"A spinal animal " is what Virchow, the great 
physiologist, calls the new baby. That is because 
some of the higher brain centers do not yet exist 
at all ; while those that do exist are in an incom- 
plete state, and the child relies mainly for his life 
activities upon the proper functions of the spinal 
cord. He ought to be treated, therefore, almost 
like a little sprouting plant, and kept at first in 
darkness, warmth, and silence. 

The average weight for a boy, at birth, is 
seven pounds ; for a girl, six and a half pounds. 
The head is larger in proportion to the body 
than it ever will be again ; the nose is far from 
finished ; the legs are short, and naturally bowed, 
with a tendency to curl up upon the abdomen — 
to recur to the ante-natal attitude. This atti- 
tude is said to favor the growth of the cartilages 
at the joints, and should therefore be encouraged. 
The baby's legs will straighten out without any 
urging when the right time comes. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 13 

The plates of the skull are not complete, 
nor do they fit together at the edges — a fact 
that makes possible the molding of the head 
often necessary to delivery. As a consequence, 
new babies often have grotesquely misshapen 
heads — sometimes they are drawn out till they 
look like a banana, but no one need worry about 
it ; they will grow to a right shape in time, if 
the baby is well fed. 

EYES AND EARS 

The ear is unfinished — not so that it shows, 
but on the inside, where the delicate bones are ; 
and the eyes are also unfinished. That is one 
reason for the darkness and silence I have just 
enjoined. These unfinished organs must not 
be called upon for work. It is a question yet 
to be settled — though it fills every young 
mother with indignation to think of it ! — 
whether the new-born baby is deaf and blind 
or not. At any rate, he speedily acquires a 
sensitiveness to both lights and sounds, although 
it is three years before he can interpret at all 
accurately what he sees and hears. 



i 4 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

But there are some things he certainly can do 
from the start : he can cry, suck, sneeze, cough, 
kick, and hold on to a finger. 

GRASP 

The grasp of this tiny hand has a remarkable 
power. Dr. Louis Robinson made a number 
of experiments with the babies in a big New 
York hospital, and found that the little things 
could actually sustain their whole weight by the 
arms alone, w 7 hen their hands were clasped about 
a slender rod. Of course they grasped the rod 
at once — a new baby grasps involuntarily any- 
thing that touches his hand — and clung to it 
while he lifted them clear of the bed. They 
maintained the hold for about half a minute. 
The power diminishes very quickly after birth ; 
when the baby is five hours old it already begins 
to wane. 

CRIES 

Even when a baby is well provided for in 
every respect, well fed, and well cared for, he 
still will cry occasionally. It is his only Ian- 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 15 

guage, the only means he has of expressing the 
thousand strange discomforts that beset him. 
For the most part, we know how to meet his 
most obvious wants merely — the want of sleep, 
of food, of rest. When to us, as adults, these 
needs are supplied, there remain many others 
absolutely essential to our happiness. The 
baby, being an adult in the vague, has these 
same wants in the vague. We must not too 
hastily assume that he is a mere little animal, of 
the lower order, because, after all, within him are 
the possibilities of a most complex organism — 
all live possibilities, in a state of growth. The 
child needs spiritual as well as physical nourish- 
ment, and he will often cry when put in the 
arms of an uncongenial stranger before he has 
learned to know his own mother ; his intuitions 
seem to develop before his power of intellectual 
recognition. A baby's crying is a complex 
thing, the expression of a developing complex 
personality. 



16 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

UNPLEASANT FEELINGS 

Moreover, we have the word of so careful an 
observer as Preyer that in the first half year of 
life, unpleasant feelings are more frequent than 
afterward. He proceeds to enumerate the many 
causes which give rise to uncomfortable sensa- 
tions in young children. Among them he 
mentions inconvenient positions in lying or be- 
ing held, and unpleasant feelings of cold or wet. 

All these sensations together afflict the new 
baby who is laid, for example, upon a flat bed by 
himself, and left to go to sleep as he may. He 
is unable to turn himself, or to escape his own 
discomforts. He can only cry. And then the 
nurse solemnly assures the mother that it is her 
duty to disregard this feeble and entirely justifi- 
able protest ! 

SIGNIFICANCE OF CRIES 

The directions usually run something in this 
wise : cc Make sure that there is nothing the 
matter with the child ; that he has been fed at 
the proper time, that no pins are pricking him, 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 17 

that the clothes are smooth under him. Then 
let him cry." If the baby were the simple 
mechanism that this implies, there might be 
some sense in such a suggestion. But one thing 
is always true : No little new baby ever cried 
for the pleasure of it, or to bring about any 
desired result, or for any other reason than 
as an expression of discomfort. The state 
of development wherein he can reason that 
if he cries he will get attention, has not yet 
arrived. 

WARMTH OF CRADLE 

He cries simply and solely because he feels 
like it, and he feels like it because something has 
gone wrong. Nor can we immediately discover 
what that something is. What adult, reasoning 
from adult experience only, can guess that it is a 
hardship to a baby to lie flat ? Yet it is. And 
it is also a real hardship to him to lie cold. And 
he will lie cold in spite of all the downy and 
woolen wraps that can be piled on him, if no 
heat other than his own be supplied him, 
Herbert Spencer points out that " To make up 



18 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

for that cooling by radiation which the body is 
constantly undergoing, there must be a constant 
oxidation of certain matters which form part of 
the food. And in proportion as the thermal 
loss is great, must the quantity of these matters 
required for oxidation be great. But the power 
of the digestive organs is limited. Hence it 
follows that when they have to prepare a large 
quantity of this material needful for maintaining 
the temperature, they can prepare but a small 
quantity of the material that goes to build up 
the frame. Excessive expenditure for fuel entails 
diminished means for other purposes ; wherefore 
there necessarily results a body small in size or 
inferior in texture, or both." 

CRADLE OR HAMMOCK 

To preserve the natural conditions, then, let us 
put the baby in a warm cradle with a rounded 
surface, or better yet, in a baby hammock. Not 
only should the cradle covers be warm, but there 
should be a hot-water bottle or two tucked in 
with the baby — not near him, but so that they 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 19 

will keep the clothes warm. If a hammock is 
used, that should also be warmed. A soft 
pillow should be laid in it, covered with a thick 
little pad of cheesecloth — not with rubber — 
and the baby put on that and snugly tucked 
in. A down comforter is warm and light. If 
it is used it should be held down on either 
side by hot-water bottles, the warmth of which 
will then come through the down, agreeably 
modified. 

The cradle should be curved as well as 
warmed, and capable of swinging. The habit 
of being swung to sleep is, after all, very in- 
nocent — much less harmful to a child than the 
habit of crying himself to sleep, or going to 
sleep uncomfortable and lonely. The swing of 
the cradle or hammock is useful in quieting the 
baby's nerves when they have been overstrained 
by too much excitement, or by a deferring of 
the nap-time beyond its usual hour. And when 
he is restless, too, the swing of the cradle or 
hammock equalizes the circulation, and prevents 
the discomfort, familiar to adults, o\ trying to 



20 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

go to sleep when there is no such thing as 
a comfortable position to be had. The ham- 
mock or cradle gently tosses the little body 
from side to side, giving it a rhythmical mas- 
sage very soothing and helpful. Personally, I 
prefer the hammock to the cradle, because its 
long swing is without jar, and one push of the 
hand will keep it going a long time. It is the 
device of a people who live near to nature, and 
who seem to have imitated the nests of birds 
as nearly as possible. If baby cannot swing in 
the branches of a tree, it is next best to swing 
over mother's bed, to the sound of her quiet 
singing. 

PUTTING THE BABY TO SLEEP 

What ! Sing the baby to sleep ? Yes, indeed, 
and pat him, and rub his little back, if necessary, 
and, in general, make him as comfortable and 
happy as possible. As both Perez and Preyer 
prove that babies have many obscure discom- 
forts which we cannot even guess, — they call 
them organic discomforts, — let us not deny our 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 21 

natural impulse to give them many little foolish 
comforts. Much satisfaction is afforded by a 
gentle massage of the baby's back, by letting him 
kick out his legs, unencumbered by clothing, be- 
fore the open fire, and by gentle and rhythmical 
pattings. All these things are better than walking 
the floor with him. There is nothing in a prom- 
enade about the room to quiet him, although the 
sight of a multitude of objects may distract his at- 
tention. Except in case of great pain, however, 
this laborious method of relieving the restless 
child need not be resorted to. Usually the swing 
of the hammock and a soft monotonous song 
are sufficient distractions. 

SUGGESTIBILITY 

Froebel makes a strong plea for the right of 
the child to have his own mother put him to 
sleep. He says that the child's last impression 
on falling asleep, and his first on awaking, should 
be of a loving voice and face. Thus will the 
tender emotions be developed in him, and his 
power of affectionate response be increased. 



22 THE MOTHERS YEAR-BOOK 

This accords well with the modern understanding 
of the law of suggestion, which has made us 
aware that the brain, on going to sleep, is in a 
relaxed and impressionable condition, and that 
impressions received then work into the very 
centers of being and later produce their inevitable 
effect. On waking, too, the brain is similarly 
impressionable, only in this state its impressions 
tend to bear fruit in conscious acts. If we wish, 
then, to have our children loving and sympa- 
thetic, their last impressions on going to sleep must 
be of love and sympathy. If we wish them to be 
peaceful and contented, they must fall asleep in 
quiet bliss. The instinct which leads a mother 
to pray over her sleeping child, and to kiss him 
as he sleeps, is a true instinct, implanted in her 
heart by the Father who sees that His little ones 
receive what they need. It is as true to the laws 
of nature as the instinct that leads her to feed 
and cherish the body of her child. 




CHAPTER II 
FEBRUARY 

One Month Old 

Now what Marion Harland has called cc the 
still white month " is over. The mother has 
been sitting up, and seeing her friends, and get- 
ting pretty presents, and showing off the baby ; 
all the time guarded by the careful nurse, who 
watches that she does not see too much company 
or get overtired or excited. She has been out- 
of-doors a few times, and so has the baby, well- 
wrapped, and carried in somebody's arms. But 
now the month is up, and the nurse, that faithful, 
beloved companion of hours of trial and of tri- 
umph, is going. 

Ah ! how weak and utterly inadequate that 
poor young mother feels, sitting in her pretty 

■3 



24 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

wrapper in front of the fire, with the baby on her 
knees ! He is a very small baby ; but his prob- 
lems loom stupendous to her. He may feel light 
to other arms, but to hers, still weak, he seems 
to weigh a ton. Nurse has filled her half-heed- 
ing ears full of parting injunctions, has told where 
everything is kept — but how shall she ever re- 
member in time, especially if the baby cries ? 
She does a little feeble wailing herself, as she 
thinks of it, and her son, as if he were a wireless 
telegraph station, wakes up and joins her. This 
is her first sharp discovery that he tends to reflect 
all her moods — as if he were dependent upon 
her spirit for nourishment, as he is still depend- 
ent upon her body. 

Be sure she swallows those tears, and in the 
necessity for action forgets to pity herself — the 
first lesson in the school of motherhood. For a 
baby is a highest education, all by himself, and 
will truly prepare his diligent students for a heav- 
enly profession, if his lessons are heeded. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 25 

FOOD FOR THE BABY 

Earth has produced many foods for creatures, 
both young and old, but for the mammalian in- 
fant, heaven and earth have produced one food 
and one only, and that is the milk of the mother. 
To give this to the child whenever he is really in 
need of it, and to give him all that he wants, is 
the simple rule to be followed where the mother 
has enough of her own milk. And in many, 
many more cases than would appear from the 
number of "bottle-babies," she has enough of it, 
or could have, if she took proper care of herself. 
This topic will be treated more fully next month; 
for most mothers nurse their babies through the 
second month without difficulty, even though 
they give out a little later on, under the impres- 
sion that a bottle is "just as good." But it isn't 
— not within a thousand miles ! — as the mortal- 
ity of " bottle-babies " bears melancholy witness. 

In general, the younger the baby, the more 
frequently he must be fed. During the second 
month, he will usually demand food about every 



26 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

two hours. If he frets, as if for hunger, at briefer 
intervals, do not feed him again at the wrong 
time, but, at the next nursing, feed him more 
abundantly. 

COMPLETE NURSING 

Very little babies often tire of nursing, and 
stop and take a little rest before they are really 
through. Do not welcome this pause, and put 
the partially satisfied little thing away, but wait 
a few minutes, and if he tries to nurse again, 
let him. Fill him up, brim full, every nursing 
time, if it takes, as it sometimes does, a whole hour. 
True, it will seem as if you were always nursing, 
— and so you will be half of the time, at first. 
But a little later you will reap your reward. For 
your breasts, being stripped at each nursing, will 
secrete more fully ; and the well-nourished baby 
will grow quieter and less nervous, and will be- 
gin to demand food at longer and longer inter- 
vals ; until, by the time he is six months old, you 
can count on your three hours' respite with per- 
fect certainty. 

We all know that, to dry up a cow, all we have 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 27 

to do is partially to empty the udder at each 
milking-time. In this way we can gradually stop 
the most abundant supply of milk. Yet many 
women fail to allow the baby to exhaust their 
breasts, and then wonder that their milk begins, 
in a month or two, to grow less and less abun- 
dant. 

NIGHT NURSING 

But this does not mean that the baby should 
nurse all night. Indeed, if he is plentifully fed 
in the daytime, he is not likely to demand it. 
But if he is underfed in the daytime, he is sure 
to demand it ! The two-months-old baby should 
be nursed for the last time about nine or ten 
o'clock, and then not nursed again until two 
o'clock, and again at six in the morning. This 
allows both mother and child to get a long, com- 
fortable night's rest. If he wakes and cries, 
first see that he is warm and dry. Then turn 
him over, love him up a little, and see if he 
won't go. off to sleep again. If he still worries, 
give him a drink of tepid water. If he still 
cries, let him cry till the proper time comes 



28 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

around, and next day see that he is more fully 
fed. Three nights of determined refusal of 
food at any other hours than those specified 
will settle him ; and you and he will both take 
increased comfort; he will digest his food bet- 
ter, and be less liable to colic, and you will 
have more food for him. 

CLOTHING 

The Gertrude Suit is the simplest, most sen- 
sible, and economical plan for dressing a baby that 
was ever invented. Its foundation principles 
have been adopted into a number of different 
schemes. But the original inventor was Dr. 
Lemuel C. Grosvenor, of Chicago, Professor of 
Obstetrics in the Chicago Homeopathic College. 
He devised and named it for his own little 
daughter Gertrude ; and after her death devoted 
the proceeds from the sale of the patterns to a 
child's bed in a hospital, also named after the 
little girl. 

The suit is simplicity itself. It consists of 
three garments, all practically alike. (As de- 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



29 



scribed here, the suit is somewhat modified from 
the original ; and experience has proved the 




The Gertrude Suit 

A y Front of Princess garment, showing tucks to provide for enlargement ; 
i?, back of same, showing tucks on either side of placquetj c, sleeve, 

made all in one piece ; </, front of waist ; c, back of same j /'and | . 
in two pieces j h^ half of skirt, to be shirred on to waist. 

value of the modification.) These three garments 
are all Princess, with long sleeves, each one be- 



3 o THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

ing an inch smaller in every measurement than 
the one outside of it. The innermost is best 
made of stockinet, and is easily contrived from 
the parents' old woolen underwear if the wool has 
been properly washed and is still soft. In the 
large cities, wool stockinet may be bought. 
Next best is baby flannel, and next again flan- 
nelette. This garment — made just like a 
Princess slip — takes the place of shirt and pin- 
ning blanket. The next one is a flannel skirt, 
also Princess, or, if preferred, made with a straight 
skirt fulled on to a flannel, long-sleeved waist. 
The latter plan will have to be followed if the 
skirt is made of any of the ready-made embroi- 
dered flannels. If it is to be embroidered by 
hand, the Princess design is the simpler and more 
economical. The outside garment is just any 
simple cotton dress. 

In making the two flannel under-garments, it 
is a good plan to run a tuck about an inch deep, 
by hand, at either side of the opening (all these 
garments button in the back, by the way, with 
good-sized, thin, flat buttons, easily fastened, and 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 31 

firm). In front, lay a box plait about two inches 
wide, and run by hand, or catch down with 
feather-stitching. The use of these plaits is to let 
the garment out as the baby grows. 

In dressing the baby, these garments are first 
slipped one inside of the other, as they are going 
to be worn, and they are then put on the baby 
all at once. Only once does each limp little arm 
have to be coaxed into a sleeve. Only once does 
the baby have to be turned over and buttoned 
up ; and the good-sized buttons make this pro- 
cess as easy as possible. It takes just five min- 
utes to dress a baby in the Gertrude Suit, from 
the time he emerges, dripping, from the bath. 

SHORT DRESSES 

Every year the date of putting the baby into 
short clothes grows earlier, until now there are 
some mothers who never use long dresses at all. 
In the Gertrude Suit, the first clothes are a yard 
long — that is, the dresses are; the skirts arc 
only three quarters of a yard. This is long 
enough to keep the little feet and legs warm until 



32 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

the baby grows better able to manage his own 
heat, and short enough so that it is a very simple 
matter to transform them into entirely short 
skirts. This is accomplished by merely running 
a tuck or two in the petticoats, and a cluster of 
tucks in the dresses. Or, when these are merely 
hemmed, by literally cutting them shorter and 
running in a new hem. The tucks in the waists 
and sleeves, described as put in when the suits 
were first made, may now be let out, and the 
sleeves of the under-garments lengthened by 
means of ribbing, like that on the wrists of our 
own shirts. These may either be taken from the 
mother's discarded underwear, or, much better, 
bought at the store. The large stores in New 
York and Chicago carry wrist ribbings for this 
purpose. They cost about twenty-five cents a 
pair, and a pair of large ones makes three small 
ones for the baby. The advantage of this rib- 
bing is that it completely protects the sensitive 
little wrists, and looks neat under the dress 
sleeve. It may be edged with a line of crochet- 
ing, in white silk. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 33 

And behold the other advantages : Your boy 
is clothed from head to foot in two thicknesses 
of flannel and one of cotton — a perfectly 
equable, light, warm covering. There is no con- 
striction of his body anywhere. All is free and 
loose. And there is no band. Dr. Grosvenor 
claims, with good sense on his side, that the con- 
striction of the tender, cartilaginous ribs of a baby 
by the muslin and flannel bands so often used, is 
one prolific cause of the consumption which takes 
off narrow-chested adults. He also maintains 
that the abdominal bandage is only an abomina- 
tion after the navel dressing has been removed — 
over-tendering the abdomen, and predisposing to 
colic and rupture. And then, how good the 
little body feels in your arms, all the young 
curves making themselves manifest, and snug- 
gling up against you ! The Gertrude Suit is 
good economically, hygienically, and esthetically. 

PROGRESS DURING THE FIRST MONTH 

In the first half year of life, we are told, un- 
pleasant sensations predominate over pleasant ones 

D 



34 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

— so it is no wonder that the baby cries a good 
deal. One of the causes of these unpleasant sen- 
sations is, in the very beginning, the distress of 
birth, and often many disagreeable procedures inci- 
dent to that event. Next comes ill-health. And 
when we remember that the mortality of the first 
year is greater than that for any other period, 
we perceive that short of a dangerous illness, 
there must be many degrees of discomfort, more 
or less obscure, which all babies have to suffer. 



CAUSES OF DISCOMFORT 



They all endure hunger and thirst — sometimes 
a surprising amount of thirst, for nurses often 
forget to feed water to babies, who have no way 
of indicating their desire for a drink of water. 
Probably they don't know that they desire it ; 
they are just uncomfortable, until the cool water 
comes along, touches their lips, and makes them 
feel better. They suffer from cold — as we 
pointed out in January. Also from being wet, and 
from ill-smelling air. This last is a point which 
I suppose occurs to few mothers ; but the fact is, 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 35 

as we shall see later on, that very young infants 
are sensitive to odors. They suffer from chafing 
— very much indeed; and from hopeless suck- 
ing, in search of food ; and from many necessary 
denials of desires; and from uncomfortable 
attitudes, which, while they are very young, they 
are powerless to change. All this makes quite a 
list of unpleasant sensations, which the young 
thing, without any strength to speak of, has to 
endure. We can remove many of them by in- 
telligent care, and we ought to do it. 



INSENSITIVE AREAS 



Nevertheless, the very young child does not 
feel some kinds of pain — those confined to a 
small skin-area — as keenly as we should expect. 
He can be pricked with a needle, or touched 
with a piece of ice, without reacting. Certain 
surgeons report that they have even sewed up 
wounds after an operation without disturbing 
the babies, who lay perfectly still, and even 
occasionally went to sleep during the perform- 
ance. This surprising tact, quite out of the lim- 



36 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

its of traditional knowledge, shows how little we 
know about babies until we study them, and 
learn the results of the study of others better 
trained in observation than we are. 

Crying, while usually an expression of dis- 
comfort, is not always so. It is sometimes a 
mere impulse to cry out, without special rea- 
son, just as an older child likes to shout. 
Sometimes it is a substitute for movement of 
the limbs, especially in babies who are bound in 
swaddling clothes or pinning blankets. In such 
cases, restoration of freedom to the confined 
limbs stops the crying. 

Screwing up of the eyes, often without noise, 
but with the turning away of the head, is, on the 
other hand, an indubitable sign of discomfort, 
and needs noting even more than the more 
noticeable cry. 

SIGNS OF PLEASURE 

Wide-open eyes show a high degree of pleas- 
urable feeling. This may be observed when the 
baby is brought near his mother's breast, or is 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 37 

put in the warm bath. It is as if, as one ob- 
server remarks, the eyes laughed. On the 
twenty-third day, Preyer's baby added to this 
expression of pleasure an audible and visible 
laugh — though Preyer puts the date of the first 
conscious smile somewhere in the second month, 
seeming to think that the child himself was un- 
conscious of the laughing. 

When he is spoken or nodded to in this 
month, the surprised and interested baby opens 
and shuts his eyes. His eyes often move inde- 
pendently of each other, and even when they 
move in unison, it is accidental, for he cannot 
yet focus and control them. At the same time 
he makes all sorts of grimaces, wrinkles up his 
brows, and moves his lips — all unintentionally. 
He squints, too, often quite badly. This ought 
to disappear by the end of the month. If it 
does not, and he still squints a good deal, the 
remedy is to have him spend much time out of 
doors, where he can look at big distant objects 
and thus strengthen his eyes. 



38 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

HEARING 

All children are deaf at birth, and for a period 
varying from half an hour to a day or two there- 
after. This is because the middle ear is filled 
with a fluid, probably amniotic. The theory is 
that the child swallows this before birth, and that 
the object of it is to protect the tender tympa- 
nitic membrane from harm, by easing the pressure 
of the air. We all know about how this would 
affect the hearing, when we remember how deaf 
we are when our ears get full of water — al- 
though with us the water seldom enters the 
middle ear. At any rate, the fluid slowly flows 
back along the Eustachian tube, and atmospheric 
air takes its place ; and when that is done, the 
normal child hears. 

There may be a further cause of deafness in 
the sticking together of the coats of the external 
auditory canal. Or the canal may be very nar- 
row. In such cases, the deafness may last for 
several days. But the full-term, sound, strong 
child ought soon to react unmistakably to the 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 39 

stimulus of loud sound. Preyer thinks that if 
children, born at the right time, make no move- 
ment in the fourth week when a loud sound is 
made behind them, then there is reason to sus- 
pect that they will remain deaf. 

EARLY RECOGNITION OF DEAFNESS 

But they will not — or need not — remain 
dumb if the condition is discovered in time, and 
the child taught language under the direction of 
an experienced teacher of speech to the deaf at 
the normal period for learning language — that 
is, at least as early as two years after birth. 
One reason why deaf children find speech diffi- 
cult, in spite of the fact that they are possessed 
of all the organs of speech, is because their teach- 
ing is deferred beyond the normal period of 
speech acquisition. An early recognition of the 
true state of the case is therefore of great prac- 
tical importance. 

SENSE OF SMELL 

The sense of smell operates in the very first 
days. Many infants will not take ;i breast that 



40 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

has a strange odor. Therefore the strictest 
cleanliness needs to be observed ; and if any 
medicine is used, it should be washed off before 
the child is put to the breast. Sometimes a 
child's refusal to take the bottle, after having 
been accustomed to the breast, is due to his 
sense of smell. In such cases, try blindfolding 
him, and holding his nose, until he begins to 
drink. 

During this month sleep lasts not longer than 
two hours without interruption ; but it is more 
profound after drinking mother's milk than after 
cow's milk. 

During the first two weeks of this month, the 
child often loses rather than gains in weight ; but 
after that he should gain from a quarter to a half 
pound a week. 




w& 


&%&!NNf!fe)A§%&&^ 




wSS^m /P 1 




t$M 






\i m ( 


©^Q^ftS, 


K* >^ '^^ 


gfw3» 






'^M^ 


^<jm 






Wm^)&\ \ 













CHAPTER III 

MARCH 

Two Months Old 

Advertisements certainly have something to 
do with it. Our grandmothers felt that they 
must nurse their babies or dire consequences 
would follow ; and therefore they bent every ef- 
fort toward that end ; and so did all their rela- 
tives. But we, who are familiar with generations 
of Mellin's Food babies ; who see the Carnrick 
babies fat and bursting on the cover of the 
package ; who know, from posters and daily 
papers, just how happy peptonized milk makes 
mother and child ; we don't think it worth while 
to make such strenuous efforts to keep up a 
custom that often makes us very uncomfortable, 
spoils the fit of our dresses, and keeps us do* 

41 



42 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

confined at home. Besides, we feel cow-like, and 
animal-like, and it is hard to keep from smelling 
milky ! At some such moment of revolt, we 
take up our favorite magazine, and decide to try 
a certain food therein advertised. Besides, we 
feel dragged out, and the baby frets, and we 
haven't enough, anyhow. 

Oh, the dozens and dozens — nay, the hun- 
dreds and hundreds — of young women who, 
on some such frivolous grounds as these, sur- 
render their blessed opportunity to give their 
children a fine start in life, and instead lay the 
foundation of trouble upon trouble in the years 
to come ! Sometimes the family doctor, espe- 
cially if he be young and inexperienced, yields 
his consent to the arrangement and recommends 
his favorite food, and then, whatever happens, 
even if the baby dies, the mother does not blame 
herself. 



BOTTLE-BABIES 



Now, I am, personally, well convinced that in 
nine cases out of ten the mothers of bottle-babies 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 43 

could be the mothers of breast-fed babies if they 
realized the importance of the matter, and tried 
hard enough, and in the right way ; and in this 
statement I will be borne out by every honest, 
experienced physician. 

As to the importance of the matter : the death 
rate among breast-fed infants is markedly lower 
than among bottle-fed babies, even in the first 
two years of life ; while, if we could follow them 
up through manhood and womanhood we should 
find the difference even more marked. For 
children who get through the first year of life 
with a full supply of non-irritating, perfectly 
nutritious food, exactly suited to the needs of 
their developing organisms, have stronger bones, 
better teeth, more abundant hair, better diges- 
tions, and more resisting power than their unfor- 
tunate little comrades, ushered on the stage of 
life at the same time, but handicapped from the 
beginning because of the lack of some important 
element of nutrition. 



44 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

CHEMICAL IMITATION 

Oh, yes, the advertisements all say that 
the foods contain the essential ingredients of 
mother's milk — but who, pray, knows what 
these essentials are ? Not the chemists that the 
food-people hire, certainly ; nor any other chem- 
ist ; nor any other person. There is more than 
chemistry in mother's milk, as we know by the 
results. The careful records now being kept in 
the physical culture departments of some of our 
colleges show the difference even among children 
strong and favored enough by circumstances to 
survive to college years. Why ! Would any 
sensible farmer wean a valuable calf and put it 
on any kind of artificial food, while the mother's 
milk could be had ? Young creatures of the 
higher kind are meant to share the mother's 
life for quite a period after birth, drinking it in, 
warm and vital, straight from her living breast. 
No chemist can imitate life, nor any artificial 
food the potency of a living fluid. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 45 

TO INCREASE THE SUPPLY 

But sometimes the milk supply does fail. 
What then ? Last month we told of one preva- 
lent reason for such failure — the taking away of 
the baby before the breast was stripped. There 
are other reasons for it, many of which can be 
overcome. For one thing, the mother's broken 
rest tells on her milk supply, especially before 
lactation is fairly established. For that reason, 
the baby, if fretful, should not be in the same 
room with her at night. She should have about 
ten hours' sleep in the twenty-four until she has 
formed the habit of nursing comfortably and has 
recovered from the shock of her confinement — 
which, perhaps, may not be for two months or 
so. 

If she has been neglected during her lying-in, 
or has suffered any injury which has not been re- 
paired, her milk will show the effects. Have a 
good doctor look her over, and put her right. 
She can better stand the discomfort of the slight 
operation sometimes necessary than endure the 



46 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

slow sapping of vigor which follows so often 
upon ill-managed births. 

Then, she must not nurse the baby all night — 
as we said before. Suppose that some other 
member of the family has to do a good deal of 
night work for these first few weeks — it will be 
best in the end, for the child's whole life, as well 
as the mother's, and that of the other children 
she may have, will be better for it. Let some 
one else keep the baby at night, and bring it in 
to the mother only at stated intervals — at ten 
o'clock, say, at two, and at six. 

FRESH AIR AND MOTHER'S MILK 

Next, fresh air has a marked effect upon the 
milk supply. Many women do not have a free 
flow of milk so long as they stay in the house. 
Whatever the weather, therefore, the mother 
should go out, at least once a day, for an hour at 
a time. Wrap her up well and put her in the 
carriage and send her forth. She will come back 
with her breasts tingling with good milk. 

Her food counts, of course. Most women 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 47 

know this, and avoid eating onions and acids, and 
taking strong medicines. But they ought also to 
avoid all fried foods, all rich and indigestible 
foods, such as doughnuts, pies, and dumplings ; 
and to drink quantities of good water, not too 
cold. Don't you know the difference it makes 
to a cow ? The repeated comparison may be odi- 
ous, but people do know so much more about 
cows than about human beings ! And besides, if 
we women could be as perfect a success in this 
particular direction as old Mooly out there, I 
think we should soon have a finer race of men 
and women on the earth, and fewer tiny graves 
in the churchyard ! 

FOOD FOR NURSING MOTHERS 

To return to the food question : Cocoa has a 
deservedly fine reputation as a drink for nursing 
mothers. And pure milk is good ; and for those 
who cannot stand much milk without harm to 
their digestion, malted milk is good. But the 
very best thing is old-fashioned aniseed tea. 
When the milk begins to grow scanty, drink a 



48 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

quart of this decoction a day, until the flow is 
markedly increased ; and then stop gradually. 
Here is the recipe for making it given by an ex- 
perienced family physician, professor of obstetrics 
in one of our best colleges : — 

Bring ten quarts of water to the boiling point. 
Then pour it over a half pound of aniseed. 
Let it stand for six hours ; then strain the tea 
into a clean earthenware crock or jug and cover 
against the dust. Use a quart of this every day, 
internally, and make an external application to 
the breasts, bathing them four times a day. The 
results will not be immediately apparent, but will 
show in from three to five days. If the baby 
shows a dislike to the smell of the anise, refusing 
to nurse, bathe with it after nursing, instead of 
before, and wash it off carefully before nursing 
again. 

BOTTLE FOODS 

However, there is a place for bottle foods. 
Sometimes the milk supply really does give out 
— from mismanagement, or disease, or inherited 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 49 

inability, or for other causes. Then the baby 
must have something else. What shall it be ? 
Well, the first thing to try is simple cream, water, 
and sugar. To one tablespoonful of pure cream 
add three of water just below the boiling point, 
and a half teaspoonful of sugar. Sugar of milk 
is better than any other, but a slightly larger 
quantity will have to be used. It can be had at 
the drug stores, and may enable the baby to 
digest this food when, if it had been made with 
cane or beat sugar, he could not have managed it. 
Try this a day or two, watching the bowels to see 
if they remain fairly normal. The use of cream 
instead of milk will prevent the appearance of 
curds — for in cream, of course, there is no ca- 
sein, the substance which forms curds. The 
proportions of cream and water, too, may be 
changed to suit the baby. A very young baby 
— in his first month — may take a little less 
cream. Later, he will take more, until, at nearly 
a year, he arrives at half and half. 



50 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

OATMEAL AND BARLEY WATERS 

As teething-time approaches, a little oatmeal 
water should be gently added, and again the 
bowels watched for the effect. If they do not 
grow too loose, keep up, or even increase, the 
richness of the oatmeal water, as it will help the 
teething. If they do get too loose, substitute 
barley water. These waters are made by boil- 
ing oatmeal or barley, a tablespoonful of either, 
in a quart of water for at least three hours. 
Strain through a cloth, and use with the cream 
and water mixture, to replace part of the water. 
Do not change the proportions of cream, sugar, 
and water — whether this latter be plain water, 
or mixed with barley or oatmeal water. A 
tiny pinch of salt is a good addition in teething 
time. 

By using the grain decoctions described above, 
you can, with this simple food, regulate the baby's 
bowels almost perfectly — using the oatmeal 
water to loosen them, and the barley water to 
tighten them. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 51 

MODIFIED MILK 

But if this food does not seem to agree, the 
next best thing is modified milk — that is, per- 
fectly pure milk diluted, sterilized, and sometimes 
peptonized according to a physician's formula. 
This is accessible to persons living near great 
cities, where laboratories are kept for the purpose ; 
but not for town or country dwellers. 

ARTIFICIAL FOODS 

Then comes the long list of artificial foods — 
many of which are excellent, so far as anything 
artificial can be excellent. No one on earth 
can tell which one is best for your baby except 
that baby himself. What will do with one child 
will not do at all with another. That is because 
no one can forecast the individual reaction. Sup- 
pose that some one knew — though no one does 
— just what mother's milk, as it actually enters 
the baby's stomach, straight from her brenst, 
really contained — of salts and sugars and casein, 
and also of something living and unanalyzable — 
electrical or magnetic, or something that the 



52 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

Ralston people mean when they say " glame " — 
supposing all that, yet no one knows what the 
living tissues of a child do with it, or why they 
assimilate it under certain conditions, and fail to 
assimilate it under others. Just so no one can 
know what they will do with various grain com- 
binations in artificial foods. Therefore, all we 
can do is to experiment, very carefully, with small 
quantities of first this food and then that. 

HOW TO TEST FOOD 

If we find one that satisfies the baby, leaves his 
bowels in a normal condition, increases his weight 
regularly, and helps his teeth through, we'll 
gladly let well enough alone and stop experiment- 
ing right there. But if it seems to fail in any 
of these three respects we shall be compelled, first 
to make sure that it is the food that is wrong, and 
not something else ; and second, to try all the 
other things again until we find one that does 
answer all these requirements. There are, fortu- 
nately, enough of them on the market to give us 
the widest possible range of choice. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 53 

PROGRESS OF THE MONTH 

Dressed comfortably, well fed, and warm, no 
wonder the baby smiles. This, the second month, 
is the date set by the scientific child students for 
the appearance of the first true, though still un- 
conscious and involuntary smiles. The mother 
and the nurse are sure to declare that the baby 
smiled long before this — but the hard-headed 
scientists will have it that the so-called first smiles 
are no more than accidental contractions of the 
facial muscles. Now, however, in the second 
month, they admit that the baby smiles because 
he feels like smiling, — when he is in the bath, is 
being fed, or listens to singing. 

THE BABY'S CRIES 

Now, too, appear the first tears, at about the 
same time as true smiling, as if to show the watchful 
mother that the capacity for joy and for sorrow is 
one and the same thing. During the first month 
his crying has been tearless. 

All his cries have been watched and analyzed 
to a surprising degree, till now we can tell, with 



54 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

some certainty, what they mean. The hungry 
cry, for instance, is marked by long and short 
intervals. The baby's eyes are tightly closed. 
He draws back and spreads out his tongue when 
fretting. Also, he shakes his head in a peculiar 
manner, as if to " butt " the milk from a re- 
luctant breast, as young animals do. Bottle- 
babies early lose this trick, finding it useless. 
A final sure sign of hunger is that the baby 
opens his eyes widely on being brought near 
the breast, as if in eager anticipation, even before 
touching it. 

The voice, at this age, is very powerful, con- 
sidering the size of the child. His screaming 
is more persistent and vigorous when he is fed 
diluted cow's milk than when he is fed on mother's 
milk — another point in favor of nature's method ! 

Besides crying because he is hungry, he cries be- 
cause he is wet, or otherwise uncomfortable ; then 
the cry is lower, less insistent, but persistent. It 
should always be heeded, and the baby's wants 
attended to at once. 

The cry of pain is shriller, higher, more pierc- 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 55 

ing. Usually the eyes are open — sometimes 
very widely open. 



TOUCH 



There are two points on the baby's skin that 
are remarkably sensitive at this early period — 
one is the entrance of the ear, the other the 
forehead. So sensitive is the ear, that the baby 
will often stop short in the midst of vigorous 
howling if a finger is inserted into his ear. 
(N.B. Spite of the temptation, don't do this often, 
for fear of a nervous shock which might bear 
fruit in convulsions. But you can do it often 
enough to verify the statement. Professor Preyer, 
the great German psychologist, is responsible for 
it.) The sensitiveness of the forehead is what 
makes young babies so often cry out and throw 
up their arms when baptized. 



SIGHT 



This month the baby begins really to see. 
Last month he could fix his eyes upon a bright 
object — or rather, the object seemed to hold his 



56 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

eyes ; but when it was moved about the room, 
he could not follow it. Now he can. He loves 
bright objects, and the light — but this pleasure 
must be taken cautiously, for fear of overtaxing 
the young eyes. He cannot yet move his eyes 
and hands together — though sometimes his 
hands wave toward a bright object and happen 
to hit it, just as though he reached out after it. 
But toward the end of the month he begins to 
be able really to reach after it. 

The squint, or cross-eyedness, over which 
some young mothers worry, now disappears — 
though when he is asleep his eyes can be seen 
rolling about under the lids in a very irregular 
fashion, and he is not yet master of his eyelids, 
which do queer things. 

HEARING 

His hearing has so greatly improved that now 
he starts at a new sound and even shows signs of 
fear. Loud noises scare him, and he tosses his 
arms above his head, with fingers stretched wide, 
like a frightened bird spreading its wings. He 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK si 

does not sleep if people walk or talk in the room 
with him, although during the first month such 
things did not disturb him at all. So now he 
must be kept quiet when the sleeping time 
comes. He likes to hear his mother sing ; and 
the sound of the piano gives pleasure. 

Now, in his murmurings, appear the rudiments 
of speech. He sounds his first consonant — 
probably saying "am-ma." He says "goo," 
u aroo," " arra," the " r " being formed in the 
back of the mouth. He often shows surprise 
(by widely opening his eyes) at the noises he 
makes himself. Brightly shining objects make 
him cry out with pleasure. 

LIFTING THE HEAD 

Of course, since he likes to look at bright 
things, he tries now to lift his head and look 
around. But that is too much for so young a 
creature. He manages to lift it, and by and by, 
after much effort, to balance it; but he cannot 
turn it around until next month. This effort to 
command his body in order to satisfy an intel- 



58 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

lectual hunger is regarded as one of the first 
tokens of a truly human intellectual life. 

Exhausted by these accumulating experiences, 
he now takes long naps, sleeping three hours, 
and sometimes five hours, at a stretch. During 
the first month, he seldom slept longer than two 
hours at a time, after the first few days. His 
sleep should never be artificially interrupted. 
Such a procedure always causes distress, and 
may lead to graver nervous consequences. 

During this month his weight should increase 
at the rate of half a pound a week. 




•^5\S^g5gpy *w srgy; 


^Bi 




-^^^ 


tfcl7f>\ 


^I^^^V (^^M i >^ 


i vwSt$~i 








^^^^^^T^^-i^'P, tia 




cy^as £ KVJ^Sf 


: t§^ 


Sg^M 



CHAPTER IV 
APRIL 

Three Months Old 

During the first weeks the baby's hands are 
much up and about his face. This is probably 
the reason — this, and the fact that sucking is 
his chief joy and occupation — why he so soon 
takes to sucking his own fists. But, accidental 
as the beginning may appear to be, it leads to 
consequences of educational importance ; for, by 
and by, the baby begins to distinguish between 
his fist and himself — that is, begins to be aware 
of himself, or at least of parts of himself. At 
first, he sucks in almost perfect unconsciousness ; 
but by and by he is annoyed to discover that he 
cannot at the same time suck his fist and wave 
it around in the air. Why is this ? So awk- 

59 



60 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

ward ! He frets and scolds, and then experi- 
ments — that is, he tries to suck his fist, and at 
the same time wave it freely — but he can't. 
After many, many trials, it dawns upon him, 
dimly, that his mouth and his fist are two sepa- 
rate things which have to be brought together in 
order that he may have the pleasure of sucking 
his fist. In his effort to accomplish this feat 
his dim will power grows ; and so do the brain 
centers in his little head. 

HAND AND BRAIN 

You see, this is the way the brain and the 
hands, and the nerves and muscles connecting 
them, act : The hand touches something. In- 
stantly the little nerves therein send word to the 
brain, or to the spinal cord. If to the cord, 
then the order back to the muscles to stretch or 
contract is delivered without consciousness, and 
the resulting action is called " reflex." Of this 
nature is our own action when our eyelids 
suddenly blink at a threatened blow, without 
waiting for our conscious brains to deliver the 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 61 

order. Indeed, they blink so much more 
quickly than the conscious brain acts that we 
cannot, with the utmost effort, prevent them 
from blinking. Thus is it with the first grasping 
of a baby ; his hand closes over anything that is 
put into it, just as our eyes close against a blow. 
He can't help it; and the higher centers of his 
brain have nothing to do with the action. 
Microcephalic babies, with no higher centers at 
all, grasp things in the same way. But when 
the baby, later on, sucks his fists, and then tries 
to get that fist to his mouth again, in order to 
repeat the performance, he does use the higher 
brain centers. A microcephalic child, without a 
cerebrum, could not make the effort. 

Now suppose the effort to be made, what hap- 
pens ? The sensory nerves send word to the 
brain that the mouth has lost the pleasant feeling 
of sucking a round, soft object. The brain sends 
back word to the muscles of the hand to contract 
in a given way, and move the hand nearer the 
waiting mouth. The muscles so contract, the 
hand moves up, and the sensory nerves report 



62 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

the pleasant sucking sensation as again taking 
place. Here, then, the baby has exercised the 
sensory nerves ; exercised the brain in receiving 
reports and drawing conclusions from them ; given 
a conscious command to the hand to move in a 
given way ; seen that command (probably involv- 
ing several dozen muscles) properly executed ; 
and experienced the pleasure of satisfying desire 
by a proper exercise of the wonderful machinery 
of his own body. By every such act, performed 
with intention, the higher brain centers grow, and 
the will power grows. 

So great is the importance of this usually un- 
noticed occurrence, that it can truthfully be said, 
that in this simple act is the possibility of all 
education. Indeed, in order to become a think- 
ing, intelligent human being nothing is necessary 
beyond a hand, a brain, the nerves and muscles 
connecting them, and the nutritive organization 
necessary to keep them alive. Laura Bridgeman 
and Helen Keller, who were, you remember, both 
blind and deaf, practically received their educa- 
tion in this way — through the hand. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 63 

THE ORDER OF DEVELOPMENT 

The order of development is, as we see in this 
instance (an order which holds good in every 
other), that first, automatism is established, taking 
care of all the movements of the body necessary 
to existence ; secondly, instinct or inherited racial 
thinking, so established in the brains of offspring 
as to require no conscious personal effort, comes 
into play ; and thirdly, the child's own intelligence 
takes up the inherited machinery and uses it for his 
own ends — ends that become increasingly wide, 
and complex, and conscious as life advances. 

About this time the child may be observed 
closely studying his own hands — and feet ; for 
he tends to use them alike, as if he belonged 
to the quadrumana. Darwin observed his boy 
looking at his hands so fixedly that his eyes 
crossed. 

But he does not yet know that he can move 
his hands and feet separately. If you watch 
closely you will see that he tries to do with his 
feet whatever he does with his hands — that his 



64 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

toes grasp, as his fingers do, and at the same 
time that they do. 

IMPORTANCE OF TOUCH 

It is of real importance, at this stage of his 
growth, that he should be allowed, and even 
encouraged, to touch the widest possible variety 
of objects. He should by no means be restricted 
to merely pleasant, smooth surfaces. The chil- 
dren of the rich, with their carefully appointed 
nurseries and watchful nurses, are here, at the 
very beginning, deprived of one of those educa- 
tional experiences which make the children of 
busy parents so much more capable than the 
others. Babies beginning to feel things with 
their hands should touch all sorts of things — 
the more diverse, the better — hot, to the point 
of discomfort, but not of danger ; cold, to the 
same point; rough, smooth, hard, soft, fuzzy, 
slimy, silky, bumpy — all sorts of contacts should 
be multiplied for them, to the end that they may 
accumulate the greatest possible mass of material 
upon which the developing brain may act. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 65 

Awaiting the dawn of this interest, it is well to 
lay upon the baby's tray, at table, all sorts of 
queer, feelable objects which will meet and interest 
the groping little hands. 

INHIBITION IMPOSSIBLE 

Also, it is absolutely necessary to keep out of 
their reach everything which the hands really 
must not touch. It is worse than folly — it 
is cruelty and folly combined — to tell a child 
under two years old that he must not touch 
this or that. " No, No ! " we've all heard 
mothers say, peremptorily, slapping the little 
hands. "Naughty! Naughty! Baby must not 
touch ! " But the baby's mental mechanism is 
such that he can't help touching. The mental 
machinery necessary to make him overcome a 
strong motor solicitation has not been established 
in his brain. He may understand you perfectly, 
but he cannot obey you. The only thing to do 
at this stage is to keep out of sight, and out of 
reach, those things which he must not touch. 

There is one exception to this rule, and that 

F 



66 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

is in the touching of fire. If a very young 
child, just beginning to creep, say, is in danger 
of touching a lighted stove, he can be taught 
better, not by appeals to his reason, or by ex- 
ercise of authority, but by an appeal to his 
reflex nervous system. That is to say, he may be 
permitted to burn himself very slightly — but 
enough to give him a very sharp and unpleasant 
shock. This impression will then be so power- 
fully registered that the same mechanism that 
makes us blink our eyes will make him shun the 
fire. Perhaps, too, there is some inherited aptitude 
for this particular lesson ; for it must have been 
necessary for the human race at a very early 
period. At any rate, this is the right thing to do 
about lamps and fires, for thereafter the baby is safe; 
and his activity and interest need not be restricted 
in order to protect his life. 

AMBIDEXTERITY 

Dr. Seguin, former United States Commissioner 
of Education, makes a strong plea for ambidex- 
terity at this early period. He says that we 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 67 

greatly injure our children by trying to teach 
them to use their right hands in preference to 
their left. He says that from every point of 
view, we ought to encourage the use of both. In 
the first place, as we have seen, the use of the 
hand, with intention, leads to the increased 
growth of the higher brain centers. We all 
know, of course, that the centers affected by the 
motion of the right hand are in the left side of 
the brain, and the centers connected with the left 
hand in the right side of the brain. Now it is 
true that in human beings the left half of the 
brain is markedly larger than the right, and that, 
in left-handed individuals, the right side is larger 
than in right-handed ones. So Dr. Seguin ar- 
gues that if all children used the left hand more 
freely, all persons would have a more symmetri- 
cal brain. There would be, he thinks, an in- 
creased brain-area, and an increased power of 
using the hands. He points out that in animals, 
where the two sides of the brain are fairly equal 
in size, there is great grace, beauty, and evenness 
of temper — as in the deer and the horse; while 



68 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

in more one-sided animals, like the beasts of 
prey, there is, indeed, plenty of intelligence, but 
coupled with a more unstable temper. At any 
rate, it is plain that the child who can use two 
hands is, other things being equal, better off than 
one who can only use his right hand. Modern 
machinery is making this double use more and 
more advantageous, for nearly all the complex 
machines, like the typewriter, call for the use of 
both hands. 

THE OTHER SIDE 

It is only fair to add, however, that some 
psychologists disagree with this dictum of Dr. 
Seguin's, arguing that the attempt to teach 
the use of two hands at once leads to mental 
confusion. These authorities say that to double 
the brain area in active use is not to double the 
brain power, any more than the use of two eyes 
doubles the sight, or the use of two ears doubles 
the hearing. They maintain that children who 
are taught to use two hands are awkward with 
both ; and that the partial development of two 
speech centers — brought about by the use of 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 69 

two hands — sometimes leads to hesitating and 
uncertain speech, because the two centers do 
not always act simultaneously. 

I confess that these arguments do not sound 
conclusive to me. Imagine them applied to the 
eye — shall we darken one eye, because the 
young child, and sometimes the adult, focuses 
two with difficulty? It is true that the use of 
two eyes not properly focused leads to eye- 
strain, to headaches, and various nervous dis- 
orders — but that is not accounted sufficient 
reason for using only one. Every other pair 
organ in the body — the lungs, the kidneys, the 
eyes, and ears — is used in both its parts; why 
not the brain? The sane conclusion seems to 
be that the child should be encouraged to use 
both hands, though not prevented from using 
the stronger one, whichever it may be, whenever 
such use enables him better to accomplish his 
purposes. Certainly, I do not believe we ought 
to insist upon right-handedness. 

The first time that our baby grasps things he 
does so with all his fingers, including the thumb, 



7 o THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

folded about the pencil, or whatever the object 
may be ; but toward the end of this month, when 
he is nearly four months old, he begins to oppose 
his thumb to his fingers, as we do. This, most 
psychologists agree, is the sign that he now 
grasps objects with conscious intention — his will 
and his intellect are taking possession of his 
hands and shaping them to human uses. 

About this time, too — just before he is four 
months old — he begins to hold out his arms to 
be taken. That is, he who has learned to grasp 
small objects now reaches out to grasp his mother 
or his father. It is almost his first marked proof 
of affection, and correspondingly beautiful and 
touching. 

What, then, have we seen, in the way the baby 
uses his hands? We have seen how he trans- 
forms the outer world of objects capable of giving 
rise to sensations, into an inner, human world of 
thought and volition. It is as if we saw him 
take up the hard world of matter into his little 
dimpled hands and transform it into the inner 
world of spirit. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 71 

PROGRESS OF THE MONTH 

Now do the signs of human intelligence and 
affection multiply day by day, until it is hard to 
keep track of them. In this month the baby 
begins to use his hands, and we see, perhaps, for 
the first time, what wonderful instruments of the 
human spirit they are. He can sit up against a 
pillow and look all around, and can hold out 
his arms to be taken. He is able to tell us with 
greater distinctness what he wants and how he 
feels. Let us see what some of the ways in 
which he tells us are. 

In the first place, he shows us very clearly 
whether he is satisfied with his food or not. He 
thrusts aside the nipple with his tongue when he 
is through nursing, and does it with almost a 
look of disgust. If he doesn't do this, but still 
frets for bottle or breast, be sure he has not had 
enough ; and give him more. There arc a 
number of books on the market advising young 
mothers, on so-called scientific grounds, to give 
so many ounces at two months, so many more at 



72 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

three, and so forth. But it is not safe to follow 
any such hard and fast rule; children differ too 
much. 

VALUE OF AVERAGE RECORDS 

Even the observations here recorded are not 
to be taken as final. Your child may advance 
to this or that stage of development faster or 
slower than the average baby here pictured, 
without anything being wrong. But if he is 
ahead of his schedule all the time, in every re- 
spect, you have reason to suspect precocity ; and 
consequently, you will know that, instead of 
stimulating that baby, you will have to hold him 
back, and encourage quiet and stupidity. While 
if he habitually falls behind in all respects, you 
will have reason to look to his nutrition ; and 
finally, if the backwardness persists, to take him 
to a sensible doctor, to see what is wrong. He 
may be all right — simply slow ; or he may not 
be properly nourished ; or there may be graver 
reasons. The point I am making is that, 
although we here record the development of an 
average healthy baby, month by month, it is by 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 73 

no means intended that you should conclude that 
your baby must grow after just this fashion, 
or else something terrible is the matter with him. 
The records here are average, and there may be 
wide variations from the average, in certain partic- 
ulars, without damage to health or intelligence. 
But if there is persistent and marked variation in 
many particulars at once, then it is time for you to 
occupy yourself with seeing what is wrong. 

SATISFACTION AND DISCOMFORT 

To return to the signs of satiety : The satis- 
fied baby, after he is fed, shows every symptom 
of a lively enjoyment. He laughs, opens his 
eyes wide, and then half shuts them. And he 
makes inarticulate cooing sounds, so expressive 
that a person in another room, who does not 
see him nor know that he has been fed, per- 
ceives that he is feeling very happy. If he falls 
asleep soon after being fed, he smiles in his sleep, 
with an expression of great content. 

If, on the contrary, he is in some slight dis- 
comfort or discontent, he shows this fact by a 



74 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

lack-luster eye, by indolent movements, by pal- 
lor, and by a peculiar set of the features, which 
no longer move under the play of feelings. 
They are passive and expressionless. When all 
these signs appear together, there is reason to 
infer some disturbance of health, and to look to 
its cause. 

In this month, that sign of discomfort which 
is characteristic of young children appears. It 
is the drawing down of the corners of the 
mouth, often accompanied with a plaintive cry. 
This sign increases in intensity up to the fourth 
year, and is one of the most delicate signs of 
discomfort. Even in sleep, the droop of the 
mouth corners may appear, giving the face a 
most doleful look. Watch, then, the angle of 
the lips, and when it tends downward, look for 
trouble — and take measures against it. You 
can often in this way stop the baby's crying 
before he fairly knows himself that he is going 
to cry. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 75 

CAUSES OF DISCONTENT 

It is not, however, always easy to discover 
the cause for his depressed condition. Frau Dr. 
Friedemann tells about a little girl who cried piti- 
fully at the sight of her mother with a big hat 
upon her head ; as soon as the hat was removed 
she stopped crying. Eyeglasses and spectacles 
often produce this impression upon children who 
are not used to them. The distress seems to 
arise from surprise mingled with fear. Young 
animals show the same tendency to fear in the 
presence of the unexpected. 

It is comforting to learn that, among his many 
causes of discomfort, the baby has nothing to 
fear from nausea. We are told that he does 
not experience it, no matter how often he may 
vomit. The act is a simple regurgitation of 
too abundant, too swiftly taken, or unsuitable 
food, accompanied with none of the distress 
which we adults associate with the act. 



76 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

HICCOUGH 

Hiccough is frequent, and Preyer records, with 
astonishment, that it can be relieved by a little 
lukewarm, sweetened water, put, a few drops at a 
time, upon the tongue, though he adds that he 
cannot discover any reason for the potency of 
the simple remedy. 

SLEEP AND FOOD 

The baby now sleeps for longer periods than 
he did at first. His waking periods are also 
longer. He often sleeps four or five hours 
without waking, and has occasional long nights 
of ten hours' sleep without any waking. 

His nursing intervals are now at least three 
hours apart, and sometimes longer. They may 
vary slightly, to suit his temporary needs. For 
it is observed that a tired child, especially one 
who has been played with a good deal, and 
been pretty well stimulated, gets hungry sooner 
than a placid, unhandled baby. We have all 
noticed how a sudden access of hunger and fret- 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 77 

fulness will take possession of the baby, almost 
in the very midst of cheerful play. This is 
because his activity has caused a large destruc- 
tion of nerve and muscle cells, with consequent 
need of food repairs. 

VOLUNTARY MOTIONS 

During the first three months he makes no 
voluntary movements. Not but that he moves, 
and moves freely ; but that his brain machinery 
for executing desired movements is not yet com- 
pleted. Few of us realize what an extraordinary 
thing it is for the brain to be able to command 
the arm and hand, for instance, to move in a 
given direction. It would take some time 
merely to count the many muscles and nerves 
involved in the issuance and execution of this 
command. And each muscle must contract in 
due proportion to its neighbor, the whole regi- 
ment of them moving in perfect disciplined ar- 
ray, like a well-drilled band of soldiers. It 
takes more than three months, wonderful as is 
the baby's growth, to complete this discipline. 



78 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

He cannot, therefore, at this period, so much as 
free his face from bedclothes, if they fall over it ; 
or turn aside his face, if he happens to roll upon 
it. Unless he is released from his dilemma by 
some older person, he must even die there, of 
suffocation — as many babies have done. 

HELPLESS AGAINST SUFFOCATION 

Here's a true instance in illustration : The 
little son of a prominent lawyer was left by his 
nurse asleep in his baby carriage in the vesti- 
bule of his home. He was accustomed to sleep 
thus, in order to get the fresh air. This time, 
when the nurse went to him, she found that he 
had fallen over among his pillows, and was dead ! 
— a perfectly healthy little baby. And there is 
another case, that of a woman living in the 
country, who, on rising in the morning, made 
the bedclothes into a tent above the baby, so 
that he could lie there and keep warm while she 
built the fire. When she went to take him up 
she found that he had stirred, and in stirring 
had knocked down the tent. The weight of the 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 79 

bedclothes had killed him. These facts, and 
many others, indicate the practical importance 
of some definite knowledge as to what may be 
and what must not be expected of a baby. 



sitting up 



Our three-months-old baby can now sit up 
against a pillow, and he dearly loves to do it, for 
the attitude frees his ears, his hands, and his 
eyes, all of which he is learning to use. He 
should be well propped, and never encouraged to 
sit alone until he insists upon it. The rule is that, 
as soon as a healthy child is able to exercise a 
new function, he will be eager to do so ; and he 
should never be urged. 



FIXATION OF THE EYES 



His eyes no longer move irregularly, as they 
used to do, but can now fix an object, and follow 
it about the room, accommodating themselves to 
near and far objects. They look with especial 
joy at the mother's and father's faces ; and as 
Miss Shinn observes, these objects seem to be 



80 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

especially fitted to attract and educate him. 
They move ; they have many lights and shad- 
ows ; from them proceed all sorts of pleasant, 
loving noises ; they are associated with many 
experiences of love and comfort and ministra- 
tion ; so that they at once please the interested 
little eyes and the awakening little heart. 

HOLDING THE HEAD 

Now 7 , too, Baby notices the ticking of a watch, 
and moves his head. The first efforts to hold 
his head erect arise from mere surplus energy, 
that, wandering about the body in search of 
something to do, contracts these neck muscles, 
as if by accident. But he very soon discovers 
that in this position he can see better and hear 
better ; and thus, following on automatism and 
instinct, we see again the voluntary action taking 
place. His head is raised for him, by his own 
machinery, going off by itself, as it were, in the 
first place ; then instinct prompts him to repeat 
the movement ; then, having experienced its ad- 
vantages, he wills to raise his head, and from 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 81 

that time on he is master of it. Not suddenly, 
of course, but with increasing ability. He can 
turn it around, this month, too, — toward the 
latter part of the month, — thus following inter- 
esting sights and sounds, and adding to his store 
of experiences. 

AMOUNT OF FOOD 

This month his weight ought to increase at the 
rate of about three fourths of an ounce a day. 
His stomach at the beginning of the month holds 
about three and one half ounces, at the end of 
the month about four and one half ounces. It is 
on these facts that the books of advice to mothers, 
already referred to, base their rules about the 
amount of food to be given at a time ; but, as we 
have already said, there is too much variation in 
individual babies for any such hard-and-fast rule. 
Do not go so much by the measuring bottle as 
by the signs of satisfaction enumerated above. 
For one thing, a baby's stomach empties rather 
fast, and a slow-nursing baby can dispose of more 
than three and one half ounces at a time without 
distending his stomach. Many bottles, on the 

G 



82 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

contrary, feed too fast ; and the child's stomach 
may fill up too full for comfort, while yet he has 
not enough milk to supply the needs of a rapidly 
growing and active organism. Let him tell you, 
then, as he knows how to do, when he has had 
enough ; and let no one else put in a word 
against him. 

THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF SELF 

If, this month, we hold him up to the looking 
glass, we shall find that the glass itself may please 
by its brightness, but that the baby does not pay 
much attention, if any, to the image of himself 
therein contained. His cc I feeling/' as the psy- 
chologists call it, is not yet enough awake for his 
own image to interest him. Next month we shall 
see a decided difference in this respect. Now he 
seems to feel much as a young monkey did. 
That animal gazed in astonishment at first, then 
passed his hand back of the glass, — thus exhibit- 
ing considerable intelligence, — and then turned 
away in disgust. Nor do monkeys seem ever to 
get past this stage. But babies do. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 83 

SPEECH 

As for speech : During the first two months 
the baby spoke almost nothing but vowels, with 
a guttural "r" that was almost a vowel. Now he 
says m frequently — seems, indeed, to be saying 
" mamma," though without the least idea of the 
significance we attach to these syllables. He is 
simply exercising his speech machinery — getting 
it ready for use. It is an interesting fact that all 
normal babies express emotions and desires by 
means of sounds, even by syllables, long before 
they can understand or imitate the sounds made 
by others. If the true bearing of this fact were 
recognized, I think we should have, in our 
schools, less imitation and response to the 
teacher's questions — that is, fewer recitations ; 
and more spontaneous observation and expres- 
sion — thus following the natural order. Even 
so early as this, babies begin to recognize and 
distinguish many vowels and some consonants 
in words spoken to them. But, of course, they 
do not know them as speech, but only as sounds, 



84 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

which they are interested in hearing. The more 
they hear, within limits, the more delicate will be 
their later appreciation of language. Mothers 
are not so foolish as some pedants would have 
us believe when they talk and talk to quiet, 
observant babies. Most of the mother instincts, 
as Froebel saw, are sound and true. 

HOLDING OUT THE ARMS 

Toward the end of the month, as we have 
already noted, we see the often sudden appear- 
ance of that gesture which always fills the 
mother's and father's heart with delight : the 
gesture of holding out the arms to be taken. 
That the gesture is a truly human one may be 
seen from the expression of quite indescribable 
longing which usually accompanies it. 

This month, as we see, is one of great interest. 
In it the baby seems to have made remarkable 
advances, and to come within communicable 
reach of our own understandings. He begins 
to be a separate individuality, no longer the mere 
recapitulation of the past of his race. But in 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 85 

truth the foundation for all these activities was 
well laid in the two sleepy months that preceded 
this. 





CHAPTER V 
MAY 

Four Months Old 

During our first observations of the baby 
we were upheld by a tremendous enthusiasm ; 
and the task was so delicate and subtle that we 
needed all that enthusiasm to accomplish it. 
Now, however, when the baby is four months 
old, and distinctly a human being with traits all 
his own, and a will of his own that shows plainer 
every day, observing is a less difficult business. 
That is to say, there are plainly a great many 
things to observe and to note, growing con- 
stantly more numerous. But also we are more 
used to the wonder of the baby. Although he 
only came to live with us four short months 
ago, it is already impossible to imagine the house 

86 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 87 

or the family without him. He has brought us 
much joy, and caused us much trouble, and 
given us considerable wholesome discipline. 
Whereupon we, being, although mothers, not 
yet wholly regenerate beings, occasionally feel a 
good deal like disciplining him ! As his will de- 
velops, this feeling is likely to grow upon us ; and 
who of us has not seen mothers who were already 
somewhat at variance with their young babies ? 

Therefore, we must set ourselves with renewed 
determination to the task of studying and under- 
standing this little marvelous being whom we 
have borne. Even so early it is something of a 
task to understand him — a task that will grow 
harder and harder as the years roll on. Be sure 
that, if we do not perform it properly now, when 
it is comparatively simple, we are not likely to 
find ourselves able to perform it satisfactorily in 
the days that are coming. 

NEED OF LOVE AND UNDERSTANDING 

Babies need understanding — dear-eyed, sym- 
pathetic comprehension — almost as much as they 



88 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

need mother's milk. The latter nourishes their 
bodies, but the former shows us how to provide 
food for their growing souls. They need love, 
too — great, abundant supplies of it. No one of 
them ever had too much. When a baby seems 
to be spoiled by too much love, it is not that 
his mother gives him too much love, but that 
she mixes it with too little sense. Let us per- 
mit our adoration to flow forth freely and deny 
it not, but let us send forth our wisdom in an 
equal stream. 

It is a well-known fact that babies in maternity 
hospitals, foundlings' homes, and other institu- 
tions equipped with the most modern hygienic 
conveniences ; babies whose food is sterilized and 
regulated, and whose hours of feeding and sleep- 
ing are perfectly adjusted by rule ; whose clothes 
are comfortable ; who have every physical advan- 
tage ; do not thrive so well as other babies in 
houses less clean, with many physical disadvan- 
tages, but with abundance of family affection. 
It is plain to every close observer, however 
scientific, that the child is not a little animal 



THE MOTHERS YEAR-BOOK 89 

from the start, — or rather, not a mere piece of 
delicate machinery, for animals, too, thrive on 
affection, — but is a mass of budding affections 
and thoughts. These must be cherished and 
nourished as well as the body, or the body it- 
self will not grow as it should. 

DISCIPLINE 

During this fourth month the child begins 
to exhibit affections and preferences. He smiles 
with pleasure at the sight of his mother or father 
or nurse. He has, for a month, been putting out 
his arms to them, in token of desire ; now, in 
many other ways, most indescribable and most 
appealing, he exhibits love ; and now, of course, 
the mother responds most fully. All is well, 
unless somebody comes along and urges her to 
" discipline " this loving, tender creature — un- 
less, too, her own will longs, now and then, to 
have full sway, and put an imperative stop to an 
inconvenient crying. In that case she must even 
take council with herself in the quiet night- 
watches, when she is not impatient, nor driven 



9 o THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

by household duties ; and then remind herself 
that what the tender young creature beside her 
needs is not discipline at all, but love and 
understanding. 

As Froebel justly remarks, the moment that 
the mother's will clashes against the child's will, 
there is the beginning of an alienation that is the 
root of all mischief. And as Preyer, the hard- 
headed German scientist, has remarked, love is 
the stimulus under which the young soul unfolds 
its powers most rapidly and naturally. If we 
love our children enough, and understand them 
enough, we shall have little or no need for pain- 
ful discipline. 

To help us gain this understanding, let us 
watch the young soul as it grows, and if possi- 
ble, make simple, short notes in some blank 
book kept for the purpose. Such a book will 
be invaluable as the years roll by. With this 
book as a general guide, note in what particulars 
your own baby differs from the typical baby here 
described. Keep the book and an indelible 
pencil near by, and, without waiting to make the 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 91 

record very tidy or phrasing it well, note down, 
on the spot, the ideas that occur to you from 
day to day, and the occasions that give rise to 
them. 

PLAYING WITH THE BABY 

If you give free rein to your mother impulses, 
you will find yourself entering into all sorts of 
games with the interested, wide-eyed, responsive 
baby. Don't think this a waste of time. Give 
up making pies and cakes, and sewing elaborate 
clothes for baby or yourself, and give plenty of 
time to the active plays that develop his mind 
and soul and keep you young and fresh — fit to 
be his mother. Do you think a worn-out, ner- 
vous, anxious woman is fit to be the mother of a 
young immortal soul ? 

Froebel, in his " Mother-play Rook," shows 
how the simple songs and games of the mother 
in unity with the child have in them the actual 
foundations of all later educational advance. You 
will never know your baby so well as by playing 
with him ; you will never enjoy him so much ; 
and he will never get more from you. 



92 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

We've been finding, all along, that motherhood 
is a highest education, haven't we ? — far and 
away better than any college course. Well, per- 
haps this play department, which, in this fourth 
month first begins to appear distinctly, is the 
most important department of all. It is not 
only necessary in order to be a good mother that 
we should know how to feed the baby properly, 
how to dress him, how to put him to sleep, and 
to take him out, how to keep him clean and 
healthy ; but it is just as necessary that we should 
understand him and love him. Both understand- 
ing and love find expression in play, and are 
fostered by it. 

PROGRESS OF THE MONTH 

In this, the fourth month, the baby shows 
himself so plainly an intellectual being that his 
progress is almost too swift to chronicle. His 
mind and will are both awake and active, and 
every day is full of interest. He is so keen to see 
and feel and know that he can now be coaxed 
even past his feeding time ; but it is not desirable 
to do this except under pressure of unusual 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 93 

necessity, for the rapid waste of brain and nerve 
tissue brought about by his activities creates a 
necessity for plenty of food for repairs. Our ob- 
ject is not, of course, to keep him going on as 
little food as possible, but rather to give him as 
much as he can use to advantage. 

He can now, also, get too tired to sleep prop- 
erly. Be careful of so wearying him, for this is 
a very bad nervous habit to form. Indeed, most 
American children already have a tendency to 
too great nervous irritability, and this ought to 
be guarded against most carefully. Fatigue often 
comes on suddenly, almost without a note of 
warning, in the very midst of cheerful play. 
Heed the signals, and take the baby at once into 
a quiet, darkened room, feed him, and put him 
to sleep. Fond relatives won't like this, and will 
keep on turning and tossing the baby, and giving 
him new things to play with, to get him "good- 
humored " again ; but, although they may suc- 
ceed, it is at the expense of that precious reserve 
nervous force which he ought not to be allowed to 
expend on so trivial an occasion. 



94 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



SITTING ALONE 



He begins to sit up alone on your lap ; but 
that is because he is partially supported by your 
knees. He topples over if he is set upon the 
floor. Even in your lap he suddenly collapses, 
showing that his young will is not yet equal to 
sustaining this particular effort. Don't try to 
hurry or persuade him, no matter how anxious 
you may be for his triumph. He will have a 
stronger back and be a happier baby if you let 
him gain power without a particle of urging. 
Just as soon as his internal and external machinery 
is all right for him to sit up alone on the floor, 
be sure he'll perform the feat with certainty and 
success. 

Miss Shinn, in her cc Biography of a Baby," 
tells of a novel device which has been used in her 
family for long, to help the baby over this period, 
when he likes to try to sit alone, but cannot 
manage it without some support. It is an old 
horse collar set on the floor, and covered with a 
blanket that can be easily washed. The baby 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 95 

sits inside, supported just about as much as he is 
on his mother's lap. All around are his play- 
things, and the low sides enable him to reach 
over and get them again when they escape him. 
She records that her little niece made her first 
acquaintance with the back of her own head by 
throwing herself back in this collar and bumping 
the back of her head on the floor. 

However, there are times when our youngster 
ought to be allowed to sprawl freely on the floor 
on his stomach, without even the confinement of 
such a collar, for in this way he has a chance to 
exercise those muscles which will later be useful 
to him in creeping. 

HOLDING UP THE HEAD 

He now holds up his head permanently. That 
power, possessed by no animal less than man, is 
now his for life ; and is regarded by psychologists 
as a sign that his will is now steadily active. For 
it takes will to hold the head erect. Even adults 
let it drop when they sleep. Until about the 
fourth month the baby is not able to make this 



96 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

steady exertion ; but thereafter, for all his life, he 
is able ; and, as we have seen before (see last 
month's outline), the motive that induces him 
to make it is an intellectual one. He is not 
urged by the need of food or rest, but by the 
desire to collect fresh impressions. 

This same little head now turns with certainty 
in the direction of a sound heard. 

He begins to bite, this month, although his 
jaws are, of course, still toothless. Biting, Preyer 
thinks, is exactly as instinctive as sucking, al- 
though later in putting in an appearance. 

IMITATION 

Now, too, appear the first faint and uncertain 
beginnings of imitation. Preyer records that in 
this month his little son first tried to purse his 
lips up in imitation of his father, and did it very 
imperfectly. This was the more noticeable, be- 
cause he had often pursed his lips before, quite 
perfectly. But the imitative act was an act of the 
will and was therefore poorly done, because the 
will was not yet master of its materials ; while the 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 97 

first act was instinctive, and performed perfectly, 
because then the baby was only being exercised, 
without his own knowledge, by inherited forces. 
If you play the piano, you know that you can 
sometimes play a piece by trying not to think of 
it; while, if you get to thinking about how the 
left hand ought to go, you fail altogether. That 
is because you have, in learning the piece, com- 
mitted it to your unconscious mechanism, which 
then works much as instinct works ; but when 
you try to remember with your conscious brain, 
all this unconscious machinery is interfered with 
and refuses to work. So it is with the baby's 
first efforts at imitation — they are less perfect 
than the former instinctive actions ; but they be- 
long, nevertheless, to a higher stage of develop- 
ment. 

GRASPING 

The baby now finds distinct pleasure in grasp- 
ing at various objects. He is still fir from being 
able to estimate distances, and frequently grasps 
short. When he succeeds in getting hold of 
anything he promptly moves it to his eyes. He 



98 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

now almost always opposes his thumb to his 
fingers in grasping ; and the grasping itself is no 
longer merely reflex, but is often an act of the 
will. 

As for his speech, it gains in variety — I mean 
that his utterances, which are not yet speech, 
but are practicings for speech, gain in variety. 
They are all expiratory, — that is, spoken on the 
out-going breath. He says cc nan-nana, na na, 
nanna " in refusal. When he screams he says 
something like "amme-a," and as a sign of 
special discomfort repeats over and over again 
" oo-a, oo-a, oo-a, oo-a." 

KNOWLEDGE OF HIMSELF 

Although he is so very attentive to the outside 
world, taking it in at every pore, as it were, he 
does not yet clearly distinguish his own body 
from it. It is in this month that he first begins 
that series of investigations which will so con- 
vince him that he and his body are much closer 
knit than he and the rest of the outside world 
that it will take him many years to be able 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 99 

clearly to conceive that, by any possibility, he 
and his body could part, and he remain himself. 
I have often wished that we adults might experi- 
ment as long and patiently to prove ourselves 
distinct from our bodies as the baby does to 
prove his body distinct from the outside world. 

For one thing, he looks at his own hands and 
fingers, as well as the objects that they seize, and 
regards them most attentively. One may see 
him do this every day, and often many times a 
day. He now looks at his own image in the 
glass, — not merely at the glass itself, as he did 
last month. He looks at it as if he were look- 
ing at another person, whom he recognizes, and 
laughs as he does so. 

Sleep now lasts five or six hours at a stretch, 
and should not be interrupted, even when feed- 
ing time comes. Sleep is necessary for repair 
and growth to as great an extent as food itself ; 
and every artificial interruption of sleep is a 
nervous shock. 

The stomach holds four and one half to tour 
and three quarter ounces. The baby should 



100 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



continue to gain at the rate of three and three 
quarter ounces per day. 

But the marked gain of this month is in the 
permanent holding of the head erect. Should 
there be failure to do this, the baby's nutrition 
and general hygiene should be looked to at once; 
and if there is no gain as the fifth month comes 
in, it would be best to consult a physician. 



_^_ 




jjgpiiiiiiiiit 










&£^$fcik 






=3 
















B 


*ZsiQ£& 






















m 








o 


■■ill 














CHAPTER VI 
JUNE 

Five Months Old 

In the second quarter of his life, our baby 
begins to have active pleasurable sensations. As 
we have already seen, the first months have in 
them much more discomfort than comfort. That 
is, the active sensations are more likely to be 
painful than otherwise. The comfortable ones 
are very passive in their nature, meaning, for 
the most part, mere absence of pain or distress. 
But now there is active enjoyment — a much 
higher state of consciousness than the warmth, 
satiety, and mild, agreeable sensations of pleasure 
in tasting, seeing, and touching which have 
hitherto been responsible for the baby's vague 
smiles of content. And it is significant that this 

IOI 



102 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

first active enjoyment comes through his new 
power to use his hands — to do something. 

Thus early in life do we see exemplified the 
vast truth of which we lose sight so often in 
later life — the fact that the highest happiness 
man can know comes from his power to work — 
to transform the face of nature, to inaugurate 
changes, to do things. Yet we adults become in 
time so perverted that we act as if we would fain 
escape that power to change and make over which 
we call work, but which the young baby, yet 
dwelling in his innocent Eden, finds to be hap- 
piness. Probably this is because we have not yet 
learned how to regulate the amount of work, so 
that we are too often fatigued by it, and therefore 
fail to discover what it might do for us if we 
took it in more moderate quantities. 

But this is a digression. The point now is 
that the baby's small, tender hands, at last able 
to seize upon objects and move them as his will 
directs, open for him, by their activity, the door 
to his first active pleasures. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 103 

CREATIVE ACTIVITY 

His great delight is to produce some change, 
and to feel himself the cause of the change. 
This is what Froebel called <c creative activity/ 1 
He saw that in this particular, almost more than 
in any other, the child was the image of his 
Creator, who fills the whole earth with His 
activities. 

The baby loves, especially, to create changes of 
form, as when he takes pieces of newspaper, tears 
them into many small bits, and lets them drop 
through the air, so that, where a minute ago 
there was a big rustling sheet of paper, there is 
now nothing ; or when he rolls up a big piece 
into a tight ball. Newspapers are almost ideal 
playthings for him at this age, being light, and 
very large and noisy, and full of possibilities. 
What if we do have to keep fishing small pie 
out of his too-inquiring mouth ? That is a 
small price to pay for his joy and growth. For 
he is, every moment of this play, gaining knowl- 
edge of his own powers that not only gives him 



io 4 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

intense satisfaction, but that increases those powers 
themselves. 

SCRATCHING 

For the very same reason he develops, now, a 
very unpleasant little trick ; he takes to scratch- 
ing. All of a sudden, out flies the innocent-look- 
ing little hand, your cheek burns, red streaks 
show across it, you cry out, the baby is told that 
he is " naughty, naughty." Now, that's a sur- 
prising result to get from so simple a movement, 
so he tries it again. Just think for a moment 
of how it looks to him. Here is his mother's 
pleasant face smiling at him, all pink and white. 
Without so much effort as is required to tear 
paper, he finds he can streak it with red, make all 
its features move in a surprising manner, and 
make lively sounds issue from its mouth. No 
wonder he repeats the experiment ! 

The best way to stop him is to avoid giving 
him these sensations. Put him down promptly, 
without allowing him to see your change of 
countenance — if you can help it ! — and let the 
only result of his action be an uncomfortable 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 105 

stillness and emptiness, continued until he begins 
to cry at it. As he does not enjoy that kind of 
a change, he will soon cease to make the motions 
necessary to bring it about. The difficulty will 
be in making other persons understand that this 
is the way to act. 



HAIR-PULLING 



Preyer reports that his boy, at five months of 
age, liked to pull a glove into shape — or at least 
uncrumple it — and to pull his father's hair and 
beard. Here, again, domestic discipline must in- 
terfere with scientific observation. For, if the 
baby is allowed in the beginning to pull hair, he 
will certainly continue the practice far beyond the 
point of discretion. Haven't you seen older 
children made martyrs to the baby in this regard ? 
I knew one big boy, with a shock of foot-ballv 
hair, whose mother used to beg him to let the 
baby pull his hair for a while, till she got dinner ! 
Give the baby a toy sheep, or an old muff 3 and 
let him tear those, if he must; but don't let him 
find out how enticing human hair is, it you value 



106 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

peace ! And here you will have to instruct 
Father first of all. For his beard invites the' 
baby's eager fingers, and at first he will enjoy it 
as much as the baby; but later, when the young- 
ster's strength grows, Father will not enjoy this 
new activity at all, and then will arise an unnec- 
essary friction between him and his offspring. 

NOISES 

Now, too, Baby learns how to ring a bell ; 
and a small silver one makes an appropriate 
present for him on his fifth monthly birthday. 
Noises now have for him powerful interest. 
Preyer's baby stopped in the very midst of his 
nursing to listen to the striking of a gong. Our 
baby's sleep, we find, is now easily disturbed by 
any noise. 

OUTSIDE INTERESTS 

One of his greatest pleasures is in going out 
of doors, but it seems probable that it is not so 
much what he sees there, for he does not yet 
seem to take a very lively interest in it, as the 
fact of the fresher air, the greater light, and 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 107 

the change of sensation that causes the pleasure. 
Later, he will begin to notice, more and more, 
the sights and sounds about him, and his daily- 
outing will be a steadily increasing source of 
pleasure, as well as of health. 



DIRECTION OF LOOK 



As yet, however, he does not seem to care to 
look at swiftly-moving objects, although he is 
at last able to follow them with his eyes. But 
it is, apparently, something of an effort, and 
does not give him pleasure. In a street car he 
will look at the things within the car rather than 
at anything out of the window. He looks, too, 
at the ceiling, with his head thrown back, and 
sustains this regard beyond any reason that we 
can discover. 

He notices, too, when any one whom he has 
learned to know leaves the room, and looks at 
him wonderingly and thoughtfully. It must 
be almost as difficult for him to understand why 
his father disappears from sight and sound when 
he goes past a certain place in the wall, as it is 



108 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

for us to understand the mystery of death. After 
a while he will cry out when his mother leaves, 
probably feeling that he has lost her altogether. 

SENSE OF DISTANCE 

He reaches after almost everything that he is 
interested in, and he is still far from knowing 
how near or far objects are. This is a matter 
of repeated experience ; and it is amusing to see 
how entirely the baby yet lacks experience of 
distance. We adults know so well that a cer- 
tain kind of shadow, a certain softening of out- 
line, means that the object we are looking at, the 
object which, as far as the eye can inform us, is 
a flat form against a more or less solid back- 
ground, like a figure in a picture — we know so 
well that this object presents such a softened 
appearance merely because it is distant, that we 
actually forget that it looks near. In order to 
learn to draw it in due perspective we have to 
recover, as Ruskin says, cc the innocence of the 
eye" — the way the eye saw when we were ba- 
bies. Then the whole world was just a flat pic- 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 109 

ture of large and small, dark and light objects, 
with nothing about them to indicate whether 
they were near or far. Only the thousand-fold 
repeated experience of moving through space in 
order to grasp objects that present a certain kind 
of appearance has taught us to make the dis- 
crimination which as yet the baby cannot make. 

PUTS EVERYTHING IN HIS MOUTH 

He tries to carry everything — even the 
moon ! — to his mouth. This is probably be- 
cause heretofore all his strongest and pleasant- 
est sensations have come to him through his 
mouth. If he is trying to seize some object 
too heavy for him to lift, like a mirror, he 
draws himself toward that, and applies his mouth 
to it. Do not check this tendency, even though 
he does get his face dirty. Out of such repented 
sensations come the materials for thought ; and 
the wider and more complete his collection of 
sensations (within reasonable bounds of safety), 
the better stored will be his brain. 

When his attention is strained, Prever noticed 



no THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

that his lips protrude, as if he were trying to 
take hold of the idea with his mouth, — that 
flexible little organ which has always done so 
much for him, and which does not know that 
this is a feat with which it is not concerned. 

The order of development seems to be this : 
first, the baby tastes things ; next, he sees them ; 
later, he sees and desires to taste. Then he 
tastes, and again desires, more than before. 
Thereupon he sees, seizes, and tastes. You 
notice the increase in desire ; and the increase 
in the number of senses and faculties that work 
toward the gratification of this desire. This is 
will, taking greater and greater possession of the 
human body. 

ARTIFICIAL NIPPLES 

This activity of the sense of taste, and the 
fact that something to taste and feel with the 
lips keeps the baby quiet, has led to the wide- 
spread employment of that abomination of 
abominations, the artificial nipple. This so-called 
" soother " is just as much of a mockery for 
the baby as alcoholic soothers are for older chil- 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK in 

dren. The baby thinks he is getting something 
and sucks and sucks, and turns it over with an 
expectant tongue ; but he gets nothing but emp- 
tiness. There is a danger, that as yet looks far- 
fetched, in thus urging him to turn to sensations 
of feeding and swallowing for his joy, — in ex- 
aggerating beyond the bounds of Nature the 
pleasure of food-getting, — of making it so much 
of an occupation that he is unwilling to forego 
it at all. Surely, this looks like the beginning 
of sensuality. But, whether this is far-fetched 
or not, there is no doubt that the habit is use- 
less, and even harmful. 

For one thing, if there are any germs floating 
around, some doctors say that this continual 
suction is the quickest way to prevail upon them 
to enter the baby's system and take up their 
abode there. For another, the continual flow of 
the saliva is bad for the digestion because, as ill 
the case of chewing gum, the saliva, being thus 
overproduced, gets weaker and weaker, and 
finally loses much of its special digestive virtues. 
But finally, and most plainly, the habit IS almost 



ii2 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

sure to lead to a serious malformation of the 
jaw. 

Who has not seen the face of an otherwise 
pretty girl spoiled by protruding teeth, over 
which the lips will scarcely close ? These teeth 
are usually the result either of thumb-sucking 
or of the persistent use of a blind nipple. I saw 
three girls in one family, all of them with 
"soothers" suspended about their necks, and all of 
them thus deformed. The oldest was about five 
years old, and her teeth stuck out almost at right 
angles to her narrowed jaw. The next was three 
and a half, and her teeth also protruded notice- 
ably ; the third, at a year and a half, already 
showed, with her few little teeth, the same 
tendency. All three were sloppy from the con- 
tinual drip of saliva, and the expression of their 
faces was noticeably vacuous. The mother said 
she couldn't break them of the habit, because 
the attempt made them so fussy. She had to 
have a little peace in her life ! I thought her a 
wickedly selfish woman. What do you think ? 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 113 

THUMB-SUCKING 

The effect of thumb-sucking is exactly the 
same. Many women think the habit cc cute " 
and "cunning/' and so permit its formation, not 
realizing what troubles are in store for themselves 
and their children later on. I have seen a big 
girl of sixteen, who, the minute she was absorbed 
in anything to the point of forgetting herself, 
promptly put her thumb into her mouth ! And 
I have even known a grown man to have the same 
mortifying and ridiculous trick, fastened upon 
him in his babyhood by a short-sighted mother. 
Think what a real handicap that was ! He could 
never rise to any position of responsibility and 
dignity with such a habit, for no one would be- 
lieve that he was quite reliable and "all there/' 
You wouldn't yourself. How far would vou be 
impressed, for instance, by a minister who should 
suck his thumb in the pulpit while waiting to 
begin his sermon ? Or a doctor who should suck 
his while studying your case? Or a business 
man who should indulge himself with a thumb in 
1 



ii4 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

the intervals of making out an important con- 
tract : This baby is going to be a man some 
day, and you don't want to put any such pre- 
posterous obstacle in the way of his success. 

Of course, every one expects to break the 
baby of the trick when he is a little older. But, 
dear me ! It's a truly staggering task ! People 
dip the little fingers in bitter aloes, and tie up 
the hands in mittens, and the babv cries and frets 
and fights until every one about him begs for 
peace. Then, in some moment of weakness or 
fatigue, when company is coming, or sleep is 
much needed, the mother yields; in goes the 
thumb to the waiting; mouth, and the whole 
battle is to be (ought over again, only now 
against a toe encouraged to still stronger resist- 
ance. Any one who has watched such a tedious 
and prolonged struggle will agree with me that 
the only thing to do about thumb-sucking is 
not to let it begin. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 115 

MUSCLES AND THE SENSE OF TOUCH 

Left to himself, but given opportunity, Baby 
will get up quite wonderful gymnastics that ex- 
ercise about all of his muscles that are ready for 
exercise, thus sending his will along into com- 
mand of his legs and arms and back. For this 
purpose he ought to be allowed to lie on his 
back on the bed, with no clothes on, or on a 
quilt in the sun, every morning at his bath time, 
and every night before going to sleep. He will 
stretch and double and twist and jerk and con- 
tort beyond any belief, and to watch him is as 
good as a circus. Turn him over on his stomach, 
too, and watch him try to get up on his hands 
and knees. Thus he gets ready to creep. 

MASSAGE FOR THE BABY 

When he begins to tire of this, take him on 
your lap, and rub his little body all over, firmly 
and steadily, especially down his back. Knead 
the sweet flesh gently, and then ship it, also 
gently, with your cupped hand. This is massage 



n6 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

for the baby, and it will bring such a glow to 
his skin as will lead to a good sound night's 
sleep, and to firm, well-knit muscles, and to a 
good circulation. Besides, he will like it. And 
so will you. Nothing on earth is quite so 
delicious to the touch as the firm, fine flesh 
of a healthy baby ! In these strokings and 
kneadings something of your mother-love and 
magnetism passes over into the baby, and you 
are more closely bound to each other. Froebel 
says that the last consciousness of the baby 
who is going off* to sleep, as also his first 
awakening, ought to be a consciousness of love. 
Touch is especially the love-sense, and we, who 
cannot yet make the little children understand 
our words, can tell them, through our hands, 
how dear they are to us, and how tenderly we 
care for them* 

CROWING 

Very likely this will be the occasion of his 
first crowing, — such a loud, triumphant shout 
of joy and of pleasure in being alive ! When 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 117 

it first tears its way out of the little throat the 
baby himself is likely enough as surprised as 
we are about it, and shows the whites of his 
eyes in astonishment. He tries to do it again, 
but he can't. At first this act, too, is involun- 
tary, but, little by little, he learns to master it, 
and then he crows away like a little rooster, as 
he lies kicking and tossing in the sun. 

LONG SLEEPS 

All these new achievements so excite and ex- 
haust him that now he spends, every once in a 
while, ten and eleven hours in unbroken sleep. 
Don't rouse him, no matter how inconvenient you 
may think the long sleep will make his next 
feeding time. You want him to get into the 
habit of sleeping all night as soon as you can, 
don't you ? And each time that he sleeps ten 
hours is just so much gain in power to sleep 
ten hours. 

By the end of the fifth month the baby ought 
to have doubled his weight as it was at birth. 




CHAPTER VII 
JULY 

Six Months Old 

Now that the summer is fairly upon us, we 
find a new set of problems in the management 
of the baby. For one thing, we find that we 
must put restraint upon ourselves in the matter 
of hugs and caresses. Dear and enticing as the 
youngster is, — dearer and more enticing every 
day ! — we remember that the floor is cooler 
than our laps and eager arms, and we set him 
there, not among pillows, but on a folded quilt. 
Every minute that it is possible to coax him to 
stay there is so much gained. 

His baby carriage, in which he may have spent 
much of his waking time heretofore, we now see 
to be too hot, — to hold him too closely. So, 

xx8 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 119 

when we take him out of doors, we set him 
right down on the cool grass, and let him sprawl 
in close contact with the wholesome earth. 

When he goes to sleep we hang a baby 
hammock under the trees and put him in it, 
with nothing at all under him. To feel the air 
circulate as much under him as over him is in 
itself a refreshment. Lace him in with a bright 
ribbon, swing him hard, to fan him, and he will 
gurgle himself off to sleep, a contented baby. 

The hammock is a good thing for him to 
sleep in at night, too, because it is cooler than 
any bed. During the evening, while the family 
is out on the porch or under the trees, there is 
no reason why he, too, should not sleep out in 
the hammock, swathed about with mosquito 
netting. 

If youVe managed to keep your milk, now is 
the time that you will feel repaid for whatever 
effort that may have cost you. For now you are 
sure of a food that will not sour, nor disagree. 
While the poor little bottle-babies are fretting, 
and throwing up, iu\d losing their appetites, vour 



120 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

wholesome baby goes along undisturbed. Your 
only difficulty is to keep decently cool and un- 
irritated yourself. 

CARE OF BABY'S MILK 

But if you have not kept your milk, then 
you are in trouble, and will be until the end 
of the hot weather. One thing is sure, — you 
cannot run the least risk of anything going wrong 
with the milk. You will have to make sure that 
it is cool, and not more than twelve hours old, 
and unjoggled. For we all remember the sum- 
mer tales of the ptomaine poisonings, due merely 
to milk that has been joggled on the train during 
hot weather. The care of the bottle, too, is of 
the greatest importance ; — it must be kept abso- 
lutely clean y the drops of stale milk not being 
allowed to stand in it at all. If you cannot wash 
it immediately, fill it with water in which has been 
dissolved a little saleratus, — a teaspoonful to the 
pint or thereabouts, — and let it stand so until 
you are able to scald it. Drop the nipple also 
into a cup of saleratus water. In cleaning the 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 121 

bottles, you will find shot, kept in a cup for the 
purpose, a great help ; but the regular bottle 
brush may be used if it is kept strictly clean. 

STERILIZING 

It is good practice to sterilize the bottles at 
least once a week. This simply means boiling 
them for about five minutes, having first filled 
them with hot water. They must really boil for 
five minutes, counting from the time that the 
first vigorous bubbling appears. Turn out the 
hot water, and fill the necks of the bottles with 
cotton, — using it like a cork. Of course, this is 
not absorbent cotton, but just the plain variety. 

To sterilize the nipples, boil them first five 
minutes in soda water, and then five more in 
plain water. Put them in a dry glass covered 
against the dust, but not against the air, by a 
piece of sterile gauze. 

UNACCUSTOMED FOODS 

You will have to be extremely careful not to 
give the baby a single mouthful of other food 



122 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

than that to which he is accustomed. All the 
pleasant little messes which we grown people en- 
joy on summer afternoons are not for him. He 
must not have a suck of a peach, a squirt of 
grape juice, a taste of ice-cream ; but must be 
kept strictly to his proved food, and plenty of 
good, cool, but not iced, water. Bowel troubles 
are so easily inaugurated during hot weather 
that it will not do to run the least risk. 

I lost a little sister through the failure of a 
nurse to obey my mother's strict injunctions in 
this regard. She had the baby with her in the 
park, and a lady, sitting on the same bench, with 
her own little children, passed around some bak- 
er's cookies. One of them she offered to the 
young nurse-girl, who did not like to refuse the 
lady, but allowed the baby to nibble the forbid- 
den cooky. When the child came home she 
was already in the first stage of dysentery ; in 
three days she was dead. Yet she had gone to 
the park a healthy, though not vigorous baby. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 123 

PRICKLY HEAT AND CHAFING 

One of the annoyances of the season is prickly 
heat, — but although it is an annoyance, it is 
scarcely more. It can be guarded against by 
keeping the baby as cool as possible, and as 
lightly dressed. It can be relieved by putting a 
little saleratus in the bath, — about a tablespoon- 
ful to the small tub, — and by the use of a pure 
talcum powder. There are many varieties of this 
on the market, but as a rule the cheap, highly 
scented sorts are no good. Cornstarch, tied in a 
little piece of thin muslin and thus dusted over 
the body, is also good. 

Chafing has to be looked out for. When the 
skin is wet with perspiration the least friction 
tends to abraid it. Watch, therefore ; observe 
strict cleanliness, be careful that the powder does 
not collect in the creases, and if, in spite of every- 
thing, the chafing does appear, use mutton tallow. 
There is no remedy quite equal to this simple, 
old-fashioned one. It is a ^ood plan to keep a 
lump of tallow in the ice-chest ready for such 



124 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

an emergency. Or you can get a tallow candle 
or two, provided you are sure that they are really 
tallow, unmixed with spermaceti. Having the 
tallow, melt it, and apply it freely, as hot as it 
can be borne. The relief is immediate, and cure 
follows fast. 

DRESSING FOR WARM WEATHER 

During this warm weather do not try to keep 
the baby dressed up. Let him sprawl around in 
just his little shirt and didies. He looks cun- 
ninger that way than with skirts on, anyhow. 
The light shirt is enough to protect him from 
wandering draughts. Let his legs and feet stay 
bare. If he goes out where people see him and 
you are afraid of their comments, slip on the 
thinnest kind of a muslin gown over this brief 
attire ; but no shoes, no stockings, and no skirts, 
if you value his comfort! 

TOYS FOR THE BABY 

More interesting, to a right-minded baby, than 
any toys bought at the store, are the real things 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 125 

in use about the house. Many a mother has 
made this discovery to her cost. Many a baby 
has strenuously refused to play with his bought 
toys and insisted in no uncertain tones upon play- 
ing with the egg-beater and other useful articles. 
Who has not seen a bewildered young mother 
offer her child a rattle again and again, also an 
ivory ring to bite on, when he was vociferously 
declaring that the desire of his heart was to play 
with his mother's bottle of perfumery ? If any 
one has any doubt that a baby has a will, and 
perfectly definite ideas of his own, let him watch 
some such struggle as this, and see who comes 
out ahead ! 

Now I confess I am an extremist in this mat- 
ter. Having been badly worsted by three babies 
in succession, I came to the conclusion that I 
would not join battle with the fourth, but let him 
have just about everything he wanted. One of 
the first things was the coal scuttle, but I did not 
shrink. I spread out a newspaper and let him 
have it. He got black, of course, but he en- 
joyed himself to the full for a half hour. Then 



i 2 6 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

I washed him up and put the scuttle out of 
sight, and thereafter kept it out of sight. I 
think I was sensible, but some older members 
of the family, who did not have to take care 
of the baby, thought I was crazy. 

THE RIGHT TOYS 

Anyway, the right toys are those that the baby 
digs out for himself, from such of the household 
utensils and belongings as can be spared for his 
use. A bit of chain, some old dominoes, a pair 
of scissors stuck in an empty spool, a lot more 
spools, some cards, an old magazine that he can 
tear, a biscuit-cutter, some little tin dishes, an old 
purse tasting of leather, a small wooden box with a 
cover that slides in and out — such are the things 
that he picks out for himself and that a wise 
mother will preserve for him. If she provides a 
table or bureau drawer in which they can be kept, 
and then lets him pull out the drawer and rummage 
to his heart's content, she will find him pretty 
well satisfied with his toys. 

For a single object, nothing will give him 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 127 

much more joy than a bottle with a stopper that 
he can pull out and put in, unless it is another 
bottle, with bright red tooth-wash in it, sliding 
up and down and foaming as he shakes it. The 
hours that he will spend with these objects look 
as if they were wasted, except so far as they en- 
able his elders to get to work ; but they are not. 
The psychologists tell us that he is a real experi- 
menter in his play, trying to discover how things 
work ; and his patience and unflagging interest is 
something that may well teach us older persons 
a lesson. 

Out of doors, nothing is so good as a sand- 
pile with a pail and shovel. The baby who 
can only sit up when he is propped will love 
to sit in the warm sand, in a little nest, and 
fill and empty his pail, and ply his small spade 
with wabbly fingers, daily growing stronger with 
exercise. 



FROEBEL S FIRST GIFT 



The first gift of the kindergarten is a bull, in 
which Froebel saw the symbol of unity. Here, 
in the sphere, he tells us, all forms lie concealed. 



128 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

In the class-room the children are taught to 
make balls of clay; then to pat them into cubes ; 
next to slice off one side and make a square ; 
next to bisect that, and make a triangle, — thus 
proving to himself that all forms are contained in 
the form of the ball. But, without needing to 
do all this, we, at home, can familiarize our chil- 
dren with all sorts of balls, and help them to get 
endless amusement from them. The kinder- 
garten balls of soft rubber, covered with colored 
worsteds, with a string attached, make delightful 
playthings. A grandmother or an aunt can buy 
seven of these little balls, and, by crocheting or 
knitting covers of each color of the rainbow, give 
the baby a really educational present. The 
colors are used, in Froebel's scheme, to famil- 
iarize the child with color before he is fairly 
conscious of making the discrimination. Or the 
balls may be bought ready-covered at any kin- 
dergarten supply store. They are called, cc First 
Gift Balls," and come in a little box of wood, 
very strong, with a sliding cover, into which they 
just fit. The box adds greatly to the interest 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 129 

and value of the present ; for even a baby soon 
learns to put the balls into it, not to be con- 
tented until they fit, and then to slide the cover 
smoothly home, — a first lesson in order. 



TOYS FOR THE BATH 



There are a number of toys for the bath, all 
of them very enticing. There are ducks and fish 
and a magnet to draw them about. Also cellu- 
loid jointed dolls that float. These are excellent, 
not only in the bath, but outside of it, for they 
are pretty, light, and strong. The baby can 
pound their heads and bodies like everything 
without injuring them. But in the bath itself 
nothing is more enchanting than a tin cup and 
a strong bottle or two. 

Once we get the idea firmly in our minds that 
what the child wants is something that he can do 
things with, — that he cares very little for pretti- 
ness, — we shall find ourselves on a trail full ot 
rich surprises. We shall find toys and amuse- 
ments all over the house, in the most unexpected 
places ; and perhaps we shall begin to suspect 



130 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

that beneath all the drudgery of housework there 
is really, if we will but let our babies discover it 
for us, a playground full of interest. 

PROGRESS OF THE MONTH 

This month the baby, already well able to ex- 
press himself, shows more and more plainly what 
a little individual he is. At the same time he 
shows how much a member of the race he is, for 
all his revelations follow along essentially the 
same lines as the revelations of other babies, — as 
you will see if you compare this record of him 
with your own baby's daily blossoming. He is 
an individual, true ; every day proves him pos- 
sessed of a mind and will of his own ; but he 
is chiefly individual in the use he makes of a 
machinery that he inherits from the race. It is 
difficult to remember that we are, every one of 
us, at once distinct persons, set apart in a little 
world of our own, and also members of the great 
human family, moved by laws and dealing with 
materials which come to us by no act of our own, 
but bear the stamp upon them of the usage of 
millions of unknown fellow-beings. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 131 

When your baby is hungry, doesn't he turn 
his head and eyes longingly toward the bottle ? 
Don't his eyes shine ? Doesn't he cry when it 
is taken out of the room ? If you offer him the 
bottle, doesn't he open his mouth before his lips 
touch it ? And if you take it away before he 
has had enough, doesn't he stretch out his arms 
toward it ? Well, just so act thousands of other 
babies, six months old. So you acted, and his 
father, and your mother, and grandmother. 

Perhaps he presses a firm little hand against 
the breast, to make the milk flow faster ? Well, 
so did Preyer's little boy, over in Germany. 

Learn a lesson from that baby, and be careful 
not to sweeten too much the bottle milk, lest, 
like him, having tasted the sweeter milk, he 
refuse thereafter to take the breast at all. 



EMOTIONS 



Now the baby proves that he notices not 
only your face, but the expression of it; for, if 
you look at him sternly, he will draw down the 
corners of his mouth, looking very pathetic; 



132 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

and if you continue to look stern, he will cry. 
But if you smile, presto, out come his smiles 
in response ! He knows love, then, and friend- 
liness, and the way these emotions conform your 
face. 

Alas ! he also knows fear. There are those 
who fondly hope that, unless he is taught fear, 
or given examples of it, or reasons for it, he 
will not experience the unpleasant emotion. 
But such persons forget heredity, and the long, 
savage, half-animal years when fear alone kept 
man alive. Babies fear without any cause that 
fathers and mothers can avert ; and they fear, of- 
tentimes, perfectly preposterous things. Preyer's 
boy, for instance, feared suckling pigs. It tran- 
spired, later, that he thought they were biting 
their mother, when they suckled her. But, al- 
though no one can keep a child from fearing, 
a mother can, by being courageous herself, give 
him both an inherited inclination toward courage, 
and an example of courage, which will help him 
to overcome his fear. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 133 

STRANGERS 

One of the things he shows fear toward, now, 
this month, is strangers. Almost as soon as he 
learns to recognize friends he learns also to ob- 
ject to strangers; and considerable tact is needed, 
right here, to get him past this period without 
fastening upon him a timid and unsocial habit. 

These new persons cause in him unbounded 
astonishment. He is struck stiff at the sight of 
one, remaining for quite a few seconds in 
the attitude he happened to be in when he 
first caught sight of him — just like children who 
play " Still pond, no more moving/' His 
jaw drops, he stretches his eyes wide open ; 
for quite a few seconds he does not wink. 
He is the picture of astonishment, — an 
emotion which he has scarcely experienced 
before this month. How fist he must have 
lived, to have made so much his own the famil- 
iar world about him, that the interruption ot an 
unexpected personality should surprise him to 
such a degree ! 



i 3 4 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



GENERAL ADVANCE 



Now he not only knows himself well in the 
glass, but he evidently knows that the faces 
therein are images ; for when, for instance, he 
sees his father's face there, he turns around at 
once, as if to compare the image with the reality. 

When he is especially delighted he laughs 
and raises and drops his arms very rapidly — 
his whole body shaking with joy. 

As to speech, he says " oo-goo, ma, oo-e " — 
and, in pleasure, cc ha, brrr." / and u are yet 
rare sounds for him, and he has few consonants. 
He often sleeps six to eight hours at a stretch, 
and occasionally, as at five months, ten hours. 

He ought to gain two thirds of an ounce a 
day. 

As for sitting up alone, Heyfelder says that 
vigorous children of five or six months sit 
with the whole of the upper body erect. But 
R. Demme thinks that children who do this at 
the end of the seventh or the beginning of the 
eighth month are very powerfully developed. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 135 

Those of moderate strength, he thinks, sit erect 
during the ninth or tenth month, while weakly 
children do not manage it until the eleventh or 
twelfth month. Preyer's baby kept trying and 
succeeding from the sixth month on. During 
the sixth month, too, he raised himself to a sit- 
ting posture, in order to look after his father. 
But he could not sit alone, permanently and 
steadily, without any support at all, as in the 
bath, until the forty-second week. How is it 
with your baby ? 





CHAPTER VIII 

AUGUST 

Seven Months Old 

A great deal of very unnecessary warning, as 
well as a great deal of wasted sentiment, has been 
uttered on the subject of the mental attitude of 
the mother and its effect on the child. Most of 
it is, indeed, confined to the effect of the mental 
attitude of the mother upon the unborn child. 
There are gossipy tales of the country fireside in 
regard to snake marks, children that bark like 
dogs, harelips, and other such deformities, 
brought on, according to the gossipers, by some 
sudden fright of the expectant mother. There 
are also the idealistic imaginings of certain 
Mothers' Manuals in regard to the effect on 
the unborn child of beautiful music and pic- 

136 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 137 

tures and sermons and emotions. But as to all 
of these things, the real truth is that no one has 
yet been able to prove that the mental attitude 
of the mother while the baby is yet carried 
under her heart has any such immediate and 
marked effect. Such changes as seem to occur 
as the result of shocks, of fear, of sorrow, are 
apparently the result of a change in nutrition ; 
the mother's organism, itself depleted by painful 
experiences, failing to furnish the embryo with 
the amount of food necessary to its complete 
development. 

EFFECT OF MOTHER'S EMOTIONS 

But when the baby is actually born, the effect 
of the mother's mental attitude upon the child 
is more easily established. Even before he 
is able to imitate her movements he seems to be 
unusually sensitive to her moods. Nor is this 
sensitiveness confined merely to changes in the 
milk he drinks, for it is apparent in bottle-babies. 
Who, that has ever tried to put to sleep a baby 
when herself in a great hurry and anxious to get 



138 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

away, but has experimentally made sure of the 
truth of this observation ? The baby who ordi- 
narily goes to sleep without any trouble at six 
o'clock in the evening persists, on the evening 
when there is going to be company, in staying 
wide awake until after seven. He seems to feel 
the quivering wakefulness of his mother, no mat- 
ter how quietly she sings or how carefully she 
darkens the room. 

Not only in this familiar instance, but in 
dozens of other ways, we may see clearly that 
the baby, long before he understands his mother's 
speech, knows her moods almost as perfectly as 
she knows them herself. I knew of one baby of 
about ten months of age who was seized with an 
unaccountable illness, was dejected, drooping, and 
finally almost died. It was not until another 
woman, herself healthy and happy, took him to 
nurse with her own baby that he recovered tone. 
Later it was found that there had been, during 
all the period of his illness, serious trouble be- 
tween his father and his mother, trouble which 
finally culminated in a permanent separation. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 139 

It is, then, of more true importance after the 
baby is born that the mother should keep her- 
self as nearly as possible serene and whole- 
some and happy, than before his birth. When 
she finds herself out of sorts, angry, or restless, 
or sad, the best thing she can do for him is to 
take herself out of the way as if she had the 
measles or some other communicable disease, 
and hand him over to some happier person 
until she has regained her own balance. 

When a mother once sees the importance of 
her own serenity and good humor to the welfare 
of her children, she will surely know that she 
has no right to allow exigencies of housekeeping, 
or of spring sewing, or of worries about what the 
neighbors think, or any other of the worries in 
which we sometimes flatter ourselves we have a 
right to indulge, to take the place of one of her 
first duties, — the duty of keeping herself happy. 
She has a right to ask her husband and her 
friends to contribute to this good end because 
her happiness is not for herself merely, bur for 
that of her family, and she is under obligation* 



140 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

to throw away forever that morbid love of 
martyrdom, that constant demand for sympathy 
as an overburdened human being, which iurks 
as a temptation in the minds of the sanest 
of us. 

THE FIRST TOOTH 

This is the month in which normally the 
first tooth makes its appearance. It is usually 
one of the two middle incisors on the lower 
jaw ; but it often happens that it is some other 
tooth ; rarely, however, a double tooth. Al- 
though this sign of irregular dentition is of 
slight importance, it should be enough to make 
the mother watch for other signs of irregularity. 
For the more perfectly and evenly a child's 
teeth put in appearance according to rule, the 
stronger and better are the teeth likely to be. 
If the dentition is very irregular, that is, if the 
teeth come too early or too late, or after an 
unusual order, it is well to consult a physician. 
He may then prescribe calcaria or the addition 
of lime-water to the baby's milk, or some of the 
bone-building foods. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 141 

Some young mothers are so unaware of this 
fact as to be glad when they see signs of a coming 
tooth, say in the third or fourth month ; but it is 
not a good thing for a baby to cut his teeth too 
early. It takes his strength, and he is likely not 
to have enough lime in him to make good, 
durable teeth. 

It is even more undesirable that the first 
tooth should appear much later than the 
seventh month. That is an almost certain sign 
that the baby's food is not nourishing him 
sufficiently. Not only is he having extra 
hard work in getting material for his teeth, 
but it is very likely that his other bones are 
not being built with proper firmness. Late 
dentition is one of the first diagnostic signs 
of that dread disease, rickets. 

HELPING IT THROUGH 

The coming of the first tooth makes itself 
known by the swelling and soreness of the 
gums, by drooling of the mouth, and by a 
constant desire on the baby's part to bite on 



i 4 2 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

something hard. This desire should be grati- 
fied in all possible ways, thus helping the 
sharp little bone to cut the skin of the gum. 
A baby who is quite fretful with teething 
will be considerably soothed if the gums are 
firmly rubbed several times a day. 

Lancing is rarely indicated. Indeed, one 
may say never indicated with the front teeth, 
though sometimes it is necessary when the 
double teeth come through. If the gum is 
lanced at a wrong time, the cut will heal up 
again and form a scar. This is much harder 
than the simple skin of the gum itself, and 
increases instead of relieving the difficulty of 
getting the tooth through. 

The time-honored method of proving that 
the first tooth has indeed arrived, is to move 
over the baby's little red gum a silver thimble. 
A young mother with her first baby never 
forgets the little thrill of joy which goes 
through her when she hears the rattle of the 
bony tooth upon the metal of the thimble. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 143 

PROGRESS OF THE MONTH 

The seventh month proved to be the first 
month in which Preyer could make sure that 
his child imitated him with deliberate inten- 
tion. He had been watching carefully to 
make sure of this fact because the first act 
of imitation is a proof, first, of the existence 
and activity of the cerebrum, and second, of 
the presence of a personal will in the young 
child. He used as a basis of his experiments 
the simple act of pursing the lips, an act 
which the baby performed involuntarily upon 
the fourth day of his life. Many times after 
that the father pursed his lips and tried to 
induce the child to do likewise, but although 
he did so a number of times there was no 
certain success until the seventh month. 

SIGNS OF PLEASURE 

At this time, too, his child laughed buck 
at any one who laughed at him, and so do 
almost all babies. But this laughter is not 



H4 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

an indication of joy, but is, like the pursing 
of the lips, pure imitation. But crowing, with 
considerable abdominal pressure, is a true sign 
of joyful emotion and may be observed now. 

In this month his child listened to singing, 
with his eyes attentively fixed upon the face 
of the singer, and a band of music occasioned 
him such pleasure that he cried out. 

He was pleased, too, with his own image 
in the looking-glass, which up to this time, 
we have observed, awoke interest mainly. 
The child is yet too young to care very 
much for the ticking of a watch, or for the 
sight and touch of pet animals. 

Now, perhaps you have noticed that up to 
this time your baby's nose was immobile. 
To be sure, in difficult breathing, or in snoring, 
and sucking, the nostrils have moved a little, 
but this was quite involuntary. No matter how 
many queer faces Baby made, screwing his 
mouth about, wrinkling his forehead, rolling his 
eyes, and shutting his eyes, he never moved 
his nose ; but now, in the seventh month, he 
gains control of that little organ. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 145 

Now may be heard his first sighs, emitted 
generally when he is lifted from his crib or 
raised to a sitting posture from a recumbent 
one. They are not at all signs of sadness, but 
mere long respirations. He often sighs when 
he is quite contented. 

When he is sitting on his mother's lap he 
sometimes pulls himself to his feet, holding on 
to her tightly, but he is not likely to attempt 
this feat in any less safe and sheltered place. 

SIGHT 

As to his eyes, the accommodation is now 
perfect, although he cannot yet distinguish cer- 
tain colors, such as blue and gray and violet. 
He sees form and other colors with perfect dis- 
tinctness. This is shown in the fact that he 
regards strangers with an expression of almost 
petrified amazement, showing that he sharply 
distinguishes between strange faces and those 
to which he is accustomed. That is, the 
image upon his retina must be very clear and 
sharp. Indeed, long before the thirtieth week, 



i 4 6 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

healthy children distinguish the faces of those 
about them. They know first the face of the 
mother, next that of the nurse or grand- 
mother who holds them most, then that of 
the father. Faces are the first thing which 
the human eye clearly perceives. As Preyer 
says, human forms and faces, being large, 
moving objects, awaken interest more than other 
objects do; and on account of the manner of 
their movements, and because they are the 
source from which the voice issues, are es- 
sentially different from other objects in the 
field of vision. " In these movements they 
are also characterized as a coherent whole, 
and the face, as a whitish-reddish patch, with 
the two sparkling eyes, is always a part of 
this image that will be easy to recognize, even 
for one who has seen it but a few times." 
(Helmholtz.) 

MEMORY 

Hence the memory for faces is established 
earlier than that for other visual impressions, 
and with this the ability to recognize members 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 147 

of the family. A little girl, who does not speak 
at all, looks at pictures with considerable interest 
in the seventh month, " and points meantime with 
her little forefinger to the heads of the human 
figures/' (Frau von Strumpell.) 

Memory is not very long, although it varies 
greatly in individuals. Preyer's child at seven 
months did not recognize his nurse after an ab- 
sence of four weeks, but another child at four 
months missed her nurse who had been gone only 
one day, looked all about for her, and after each 
vain searching cried bitterly. 

SPEECH 

Now the child has already increased his reper- 
toire of sounds. His screams, even, which in 
this month are apt to be loud and prolonged, 
have a greater variety of sound and give more 
exercise to his coming powers of speech than 
heretofore. He says: a ma, a, u> a, uiie." And 
when he is contented, " ooroo." But when be 
wants anything very badly he will scream himself 
hoarse in the effort to get it. When be is bun- 



148 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

gry he draws his tongue back, broadening and 
shortening it when screaming, and makes loud 
expirations with longer or shorter intervals be- 
tween. But in pain the scream is high, piercing, 
and uninterrupted. In the midst of his crying 
one may sometimes distinguish the rare conso- 
nants / and t. Often he says i s d 3 m y n> r, g, 
and h. He achieves k only when he yawns, and 
says p occasionally both when he is crying and 
when he is engaged in friendly prattle. You 

will note that by little and little the child's organs 
of speech are being practiced in all the elements 
of speech, which he will combine later on when 
he comes to form words. 

TEMPERATURE OF BATH AND BOTTLE 

It is evident that the very young children 
dislike to be wet anywhere, especially with cold 
water. They are apparently much more sen- 
sitive than are older children to the local with- 
drawal of heat; therefore they object violently 
if their bath is below a certain temperature, 
although when they grow older they may be 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 149 

trained to overcome this fear of cold water by 
experience of the refreshing after effects. In re- 
gard to this feeling for temperature, individual 
children vary greatly, and it is not therefore prac- 
ticable for any one to lay down an absolute law 
as to what should be the temperature of the 
baby's bath. The only safe rule is that it should 
be as cool as it can be and yet be agreeable to 
him, and that as time goes on it may be made 
a very little cooler every day. Preyer's boy 
allowed his bath to be cooled to 32J C. 
(89.7 F.) without making any objections, but 
at 31J C. (88|° F.) he invariably cried, 
no matter how gently they added the cold water. 
But by the time he was two and a half years old 
he allowed the water as cool as the air of the 
room he lived in, that is, so cold that it had for- 
merly made him cry, and at four years of age he 
objected to a warm bath at 36° C. (96. 8° F.). 
When he was first put into the water he always 
became pale, but was all right in one or two 
minutes. This was a case not of the immediate 
effect of cold upon the capillaries, but a vaso- 



i 5 o 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



motor reflex, as was shown by the fact that the 
face, which was not wet at all, was the first to 
show the pallor. He gave this undoubted sign 
of the organic sensitiveness of the young child 
to the cold until he was two years old. 

In the same way the child is exceedingly par- 
ticular about the temperature of the milk which 
he drinks from the nursing bottle. This should 
be as nearly as possible the temperature of the 
milk as it comes from the mother's breast, about 
37 C. (98. 6° F.), yet they can by degrees be 
taught to drink milk, then water, at about the 
temperature of the room. 




M§^^ 




yT^x^llf^&r 


JJf%b 




r^c^P 


;^^SV^-C 












^^ 


JHr^% 


S^SS^R 






^r^Sl 



CHAPTER IX 

SEPTEMBER 

Eight Months Old 

There used to be quite a superstition as to the 
baleful effects of night air. One might almost 
have thought to hear our grandmothers talk that 
night was a time when it was safer to suffocate 
than to breathe. Probably the notion had its 
origin in the early days of the country when the 
undrained swamps gave forth malaria (which 
is itself now known to be due to the bite of a 
certain mosquito), and made it unsafe to be out 
of doors after sundown. This condition has now 
been remedied in almost all parts of the country, 
and there is nothing to be dreaded in night air 
more than in the air of the day. We need only 
to be careful that the sleeping body, which has 

151 



152 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

less power of resistance, is not exposed to undue 
currents of air, producing too rapid evaporation. 

Even on warm nights, therefore, it is necessary 
to keep the baby covered if only with a light 
knit shawl. He must also be kept out of the 
way of draughts, for draughts, as you know, dry 
the surface of the skin and produce evaporation 
so rapid as considerably to lower the surface 
temperature of the body. 

SCREENS 

In order to give the baby the benefit of plenty 
of pure fresh air without the harm of direct air 
currents, screens are most useful. A few years 
ago these were both expensive and flimsy, but 
now good strong ones, designed especially for 
nursery use, may be had for little money. If the 
man of the house is handy with tools he can 
easily construct one himself. What is required 
is merely a rectangular frame of wood, set upon a 
standard sufficiently wide to keep it from easily 
toppling over ; or a folding screen may be con- 
structed of two or three such rectangles hinged 
together, and standing upon their own bases. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 153 

These screens may then be covered with building 
paper, and upon this be pasted bright-colored 
pictures which will interest and amuse the baby ; 
or it may be covered with colored burlap or 
cretonne or chintz without any decoration. A 
small-sized folding clotheshorse may be used 
as the basis for such a screen if the man of the 
house cannot be induced to make a special frame. 
But the clotheshorse is usually a little wide for 
one breadth of cloth and is not so graceful in 
its proportions as a frame made for the purpose. 

DRAUGHTS 

Out-door breezes are in some subtle way 
different from draughts. Perhaps it is simply 
because the air is purer and warmed by the sun. 
But even they should not be allowed to blow 
directly upon the baby when the temperature is 
less than 95 . Choose for him some sheltered 
corner where the air is fresh because the breeze 
is stirring just outside, but where the currents 
do not strike upon him. 

Within doors look out for the draughts along 
the floor, especially during these cool nights and 



154 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

mornings. When the baby is put down on the 
floor, see that he has a quilt under him and that 
it is placed in some corner out of reach of air 
from either door or window. Some fond parents 
have built for their baby's use a platform on 
casters, the platform being about five feet square. 
A railing about a foot and a half high still further 
protects the baby upon it. The platform can 
be pushed about and set anywhere, and the baby 
upon it, his thick quilt under him, and his toys 
all about, is safer and happier than any king 
upon his throne. 

TOO MUCH ATTENTION 

Young trees, young plants, and young children 
require plenty of room. Just as a little plant 
growing under the leaves of a larger and stronger 
plant fails to get its full share of nourishment, 
and if it is not transplanted to some freer space 
droops and withers, so a very young child, set 
too constantly under the shadow of grown-up 
human beings, pines for his own proper freedom 
and space. It is true that he cannot yet maintain 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 155 

himself alone, and that therefore he must have 
within constant reach some one who can attend to 
his many wants ; but, nevertheless, he needs to 
be let alone almost as much as he needs to be 
cared for. The first grandchild in a large family 
is apt to be particularly unfortunate in this 
respect. His many relatives positively crowd 
him out of breathing space. A weakly child 
grows nervous under the affliction, and a strong 
one obstreperously rebels. 

A STRUGGLE FOR INDIVIDUALITY 

There was one sensitive, high-spirited little 
boy who went through the first two years of life 
with a perpetual defiant scowl upon his face, 
brought there by this effort to keep free from 
invaders the boundaries of his struggling person- 
ality. He was the only child in a large family. 
Everything about him offered continual tempta- 
tions. They wanted to kiss him, to hug him, 
and to play with him all the time. His mother 
protested against so much attention, and each of 
the family thereupon began to force himself to 



156 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

resist temptation. After letting the baby alone 
say a dozen times, it seemed no more than fair to 
have a good frolic with him the thirteenth time. 
Each one felt that he had been not only moderate 
in his demands, but abstemious, yet all put to- 
gether, they made a constant and wearing drain 
upon the child's vitality. He was five or six 
years old before he recovered from this treatment, 
and even then he was more nervous and less 
friendly than he ought to have been. 



KISSES AND HUGS 



A wholesome, happy, fat, healthy baby is 
indeed a temptation to every one who loves him. 
No one — not even his mother — gets from him 
as many kisses and hugs as she wants. But we 
must always remember that such caresses please 
us more than they do him. As a rule, he endures 
rather than enjoys them. 

In spite of his charm and attractiveness, we 
must force ourselves to give him, every day, 
plenty of chance to live alone with himself; to 
gurgle and coo and roll and bite things, and 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 157 

blink at the ceiling, and play with his own little 
fingers and toes, and practice all sorts of other 
enchanting accomplishments without an audience. 
If we really have to take a peep at him now and 
then, just to see what he is up to, let us do 
it so secretly that he will not suspect it. 



INTERRUPTIONS 



Above all, let us not interrupt him in his play, 
for, as we have seen while watching his progress 
month by month, in all these activities he is 
really gaining possession of his own faculties and 
acquiring knowledge of the outside world. We 
do not know what chain of thought and feeling 
we may be breaking when we pick him up for a 
moment's kiss and put him back again. Every 
such interruption is a break in his process of 
growth. Only when he begins to fret for atten- 
tion should we give it. 

Yet this does not mean, of course, that we 
should in any way neglect him, or keep away 
from him outward and visible tokens ot that 
abundance of love which our hearts yearn to 



158 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

bestow and on which he thrives. There are 
times in every day when he is glad of love and 
cuddling, — all the more so if the day has had 
within it quiet, empty spaces. And these times 
are for our opportunity. We can then love 
him to our heart's content without interfering 
with the freedom necessary for his individual 
growth. 

PROGRESS OF THE MONTH 

We have seen how in the month before this, 
the eighth month, the child became gradually 
aware of his hands, interested in them, and able 
to use them. Now he discovers his feet and 
sometimes other parts of his body also. He 
does not yet seem to know, however, that they 
are parts of his body, but regards them merely 
as interesting, movable objects within easy reach. 
He likes to put his legs straight up in the air and 
examine his little toes. Grasping the foot firmly 
with both hands, he carries it safely to his mouth. 
In doing so he sometimes misses his aim and 
puts the toe into his ear or his eye instead ! But 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 159 

although this surprises him, it does not discourage 
him : he merely tries again. 

After human faces, which interest him most of 
all, he is, if he is fed from the bottle, interested in 
all bottles. He associates them with the pleasure 
he is receiving from the nursing bottle, and his 
eyes shine and lips protrude at the sight of one. 

FALLING OBJECTS 

Now, in playing with him, a curious thing may 
be noticed. He may be much interested in a 
plaything, say a bit of bright feather or a piece of 
paper, but when he lets it fall he does not look 
after it, nor seem to have the least idea where it 
has gone to. He has not yet made the discovery 
that objects unsupported fall to the ground. This 
fact each human being has to discover for himself, 
and the eighth month is the time usually taken 
for the discovery. As the month advances, it 
may be seen that if the object moves slowly down- 
ward, as a feather does, he follows it with his 
eyes; also if it makes a noise when it hits the 
ground he looks at it. But it takes many such 



160 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

experiences to convince him that when he lets go 
of that which he is holding it will surely fall to 
the floor unless something interposes. 

His language of desire and interest is becom- 
ing plainer and plainer. He protrudes his lips 
when his attention is held ; he reaches out his 
hands in the effort to grasp innumerable things 
that interest him. 

He has laughed before, but purely from imi- 
tation. In this month he laughs genuinely and 
loudly as an expression of joy. Any one who 
hears him knows that he is gay and full of life. 
The two things that delight him most are 
friendly faces and singing, 

LEARNING TO KISS 

Up to this time he has gone through various 
little lip performances which the proud mother 
has called kisses. But, as a matter of fact, he 
has been and is yet quite unable to kiss any one 
with intention. Not only that, but he doesn't 
like either to kiss or to be kissed except as 
through warm contact of his mother he is assured 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 161 

of her comforting presence. Kissing is a late 
acquirement. It is not inherited and there are 
many nations which do not know it or practice 
it. Therefore it is not an instinct with the child, 
but is a conventional sign of affection which has 
to be slowly acquired. Preyer records that on 
the eleventh day, when his little boy " was kissed 
by his mother on the mouth, the baby fairly 
seized one of her lips with his and sucked it as if 
he had got the breast, putting out his tongue." 
But when he was thirty-two weeks old he no 
longer sucked at the lips he was kissing, but 
licked them, as he licked everything else that 
pleased him. He learned then not to resist the 
attempt to kiss him, but he gave no particular 
response, although in other ways he showed that 
he felt affectionate. It was not until he was three 
years old that he gave genuine spontaneous 
kisses as an expression of gratitude and good will. 
Preyer sums up the situation thus: "At first, 
then, the lips of the mother, when she kisses her 
child, are treated like the finger held to the 
mouth, or like the breast, as objects to be sucked; 

M 



162 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

then they are licked, as by a puppy ; next, the 
kiss is endured ; further on, it is refused ; soon 
afterward it is awkwardly, and only on request, 
returned ; and, finally, it is spontaneously given 
as a sign of thanks and affection — and this by a 
boy who is not in the least tender and is not 
trained." 

SPEECH 

By this time the child has practiced himself 
somewhat in almost all the elements of speech. 
He has made all the sounds which he will after- 
ward use in his speech, and even more than 
these ; but still he cannot reproduce any of them 
purposely. They have all been made not inten- 
tionally, but at random. He repeats them be- 
cause he likes to practice such sounds, not aiming 
to make any particular one, but just moving his 
lips and tongue and his vocal chords in all sorts 
of ways, and experiencing the results with pleas- 
ure. Some observers have supposed that he 
made in these early months only those sounds 
which were least complicated and most easily 
produced, but the fact is that he even achieves 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 163 

quite difficult sounds ; sounds such as in later 
life, when he tries to learn a foreign language, he 
finds most difficult of imitation. And it must be 
clearly understood that he just happens to make 
these noises in the general exercise given to all 
his speech organs and in their remarkable flexi- 
bility at this early stage. He cannot reproduce 
even simple sounds by imitation with any cer- 
tainty. For instance, he tries to say Papa, and 
succeeds only in saying Ta-ta, and this in spite 
of the fact that he perfectly well distinguishes the 
difference between the two sounds. That he 
does so distinguish is shown by the fact that he 
understands the difference in the words when 
they are spoken to him by another person. He 
knows what to look for when he is told that papa 
is coming. He turns his eyes and his body 
toward the door when any one asks him if he 
wants to go Ta-ta. But within his brain the 
association-paths between sounds heard and to 
be reproduced have not yet been so clearly 
marked that his nervous energy call traverse 
them with certainty. 




CHAPTER X 
OCTOBER 

Nine Months Old 

Even before the baby is nine months old, he 
has already proved his ability to raise himself 
on to his hands and knees. These move- 
ments have probably appeared first in the 
bath, because then he is free of the weight of 
skirts and clothing, and the water itself helps 
to hold him up. But by the time he is nine 
months old, if he is a vigorous child, he is 
probably making active efforts to creep about 
on all fours. This makes him so dirty, and 
is so hard on his clothes, that many mothers 
discourage it. Nurses especially feel that the 
creeping child is much harder to take care of 

than the child who can be peacefully confined 

164 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 165 

to his crib or baby carriage. For, as soon as 
the child begins to creep about, the floor must 
be looked after and freed of all objects which 
could in any way hurt him. Pins and tacks 
and pieces of colored paper, even threads, have 
to be guarded against, or the inquisitive baby, 
who puts everything into his mouth, will be 
sure to get them. 

INCONVENIENCES OF CREEPING 

Besides these really harmful objects, there 
are some other things which disturb the 
mother's sense of pride in her hitherto clean 
and kissable youngster. He shows now, for 
instance, the most uncomfortable determination 
to play with the coal scuttle. As soon as he 
can creep, or even hitch about on the floor, he 
makes a bee line for that black object, and, 
unless deterred, sucks away at each piece ot 
coal as if it were a chocolate cream. Imagine 
then the state of his white dress, and ot his 
hands and face ! 

Creeping, moreover, is very hard on the 



166 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

baby's clothes. He wears out the knees of 
his stockings, and scuffs out the toes of his 
shoes. His dresses become so dirty that they 
have to be fairly worn out by rubbing before 
they can be made clean. All these things are 
real annoyances incidental to the creeping 
period, and unless the mother is so well-in- 
formed and intelligent that she knows the com- 
pensating advantages of the period, the baby is 
likely to be considerably restrained in his natural 
activities. But there is another side to the 
question. Most of the difficulties here enu- 
merated can be overcome by clothing the child 
properly. But such as remain must be endured 
if we want to have the child develop as Nature 
intended that he should. 

IMPORTANCE OF CREEPING 

On this subject Preyer remarks : cc Creeping, 
the natural preparatory school for walking, is but 
too often not permitted to the child, although 
it contributes vastly to his mental development. 
For liberty to get a desired object, to look 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 167 

at it and to feel of it, is much earlier gained 
by the creeping child than by the one who 
must always have help in order to change 
his location. Mother and nurses in many 
families prevent children from creeping before 
they can stand, through mere prejudice and 
even superstition ; even when it is not the con- 
venience of the elders, it may be their disinclina- 
tion to observe watchfully the freely-moving 
child that determines the unjustifiable prohibi- 
tion. It cannot be a matter of indifference 
for the normal mental development of the 
child not yet a year old whether it is packed 
in a basket for hours, is swathed in swaddling- 
clothes, is tied to a chair, or is allowed to 
creep about in perfect freedom upon a large 
spread, out of doors in summer, and in a 
room moderately heated in winter." 

AN AMUSING DIFFICULTY 

The baby encounters a difficulty which is 
at first most amusing to the onlookers, but 
which presently becomes tiresome even to 



168 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

them. As for the little fellow himself, he 
becomes perfectly enraged. The trouble is 
this : his arms are so much stronger and 
better developed than his legs, that he pushes 
himself backward instead of forward. The 
harder he tries to go toward a desired object, 
the more rapidly he scuttles away from it, 
scolding and fretting all the time. Some 
patience on the part of the mother is here 
required. She will have to get down on the floor 
with him, and put her hands behind first one 
little pushing foot, and then the other, until 
he gradually grows strong enough to make 
his knees do their proper work. Sometimes it 
takes almost a week to teach a baby to go for- 
ward instead of backward, and it is partly be- 
cause few women take time so to help the 
baby that he learns to get around the difficulty 
himself by various procedures. Sometimes he 
gives up trying to use his hands and legs at 
all, and hitches about over the floor in a sitting 
posture ; or he uses one knee and one foot ; or 
sometimes both feet, scuttling about with his hips 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 169 

raised considerably higher than his head. There 
is nothing very harmful about these rather 
awkward procedures. They at least attain the 
chief object of permitting the child to move 
himself in the direction of whatever he desires. 
But they are not as graceful a means of loco- 
motion, nor as well suited for the harmonious 
development of all the body muscles, as is the 
ordinary creeping on hands and knees. 

About the same time that the baby begins to 
creep he shows a strong proclivity for climbing, 
and this, too, has occasioned much anxiety to 
mothers, who like to have their children keep 
to safe and limited fields of experience. The 
stairs especially attract the young explorer, and 
to prevent him from using them all sorts of 
gates and guards have been invented. 

THE STAIRS 

But the truth is that his attraction to the 
stairs, like most other spontaneous attractions, 
is a sign that they arc good for him. He 
needs to climb and to stretch in this wav certain 



1 7 o THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

of the trunk muscles which are not sufficiently 
exercised in creeping on a level. Instead of 
trying, then, to prevent him from this exercise, 
suppose you take an hour or two off some 
morning and show him how to creep up and 
down stairs with safety. This needs to be 
done just as soon as he shows a desire to climb 
the stairs, because if he is thwarted in his first 
efforts, he will get so excited and eager when 
he is finally permitted to try that he will no 
longer be in a teachable condition. 

This is the way to teach him : start him at the 
top of the stairs, kneeling two or three steps 
below him ; pull down one little leg until the 
knee rests upon the step ; then pull down the 
other knee, and thus show him how to go down 
feet foremost. Every time he starts to turn 
around and go sideways restrain him and put 
him straight. It will be easy to do this in a 
playful and loving manner that will not rouse 
his ire. After he has gone downstairs in this 
fashion, say a dozen times, the habit will be 
pretty well formed. The point is never to 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 171 

allow him to form the opposite habit of turning 
on the step. If he shows a strong tendency to 
do so let him turn and fall while you are there 
to catch him. But see to it that he bumps 
himself a little — enough at any rate to make 
him cry, and be undesirous of repeating the 
performance. Once he has been taught to go 
down in this way, he is perfectly safe on the 
stairway and will spend joyous hours there. 

Think of the increase in the territory over 
which he is now master ! Instead of one little 
room or the places which he could see from his 
mother's arms or his perambulator, but which 
he could not explore by his own initiative, he 
now has practically the range of the entire house. 
He is likely to pop his little grimy, interested 
face into the parlor or the kitchen at the most 
unexpected junctures. But then, dirty, or not, 
isn't he a welcome visitor ? 

CREEPING CLOTHES 

Now we have to give up the attempt to keep 
him dainty, and confine ourselves to considering 



1 72 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

strict utility in his clothing. Only on company 
occasions and for a brief half hour at a time will 
he be able to wear the delicate little white dresses, 
in the fashioning of which we have taken so 
much pride. Now, from morning till night, will 
he disport himself in the dark blue overalls 
which proclaim his kinship with the world of 
laboring men ; and this is well, for, after all, this 
young son of ours is not going to be a lily of the 
field, clothed upon with perishable glory, but a 
member of the toiling, sweating, useful, and, on 
the whole, pretty happy human family. 

In order that the child may freely enjoy the 
creeping period and at the same time bring as 
little annoyance as possible to his mother, he 
must be clothed with an express eye to the 
nature of his activities. The best creeping 
clothes are probably the little dark blue overalls 
just referred to. The legs are made very full 
and baggy, and drawn in at the knees with an 
elastic band. They are, in short, much like a 
pair of Turkish trousers. Dark blue German 
calico, which is heavier than the American calico, 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 173 

is the best material of which to make them. 
They are cut in two pieces after any ordinary 
trousers pattern, stitched up at the seams, and 
hemmed with an inch-wide hem around the waist 
and the knees. A narrow flat silk elastic (not 
round) is then run into these hems. Silk elastic 
is preferred because it is more flexible than the 
cotton and does not bind the legs and waist so 
tightly. This little garment may then be drawn 
on right over the baby's skirts, when the waist 
elastic will fasten it securely in position. 

WAISTS AND SLEEVES 

Some of the ready-made creepers have a bib 
like an overall bib, and this has the advantage of 
holding the garment more securely. It is, how- 
ever, more troublesome when the baby needs to 
be changed. 

But the baby's sleeves and arms get very 
much soiled, too. Therefore it is well to make 
him a little loose, long-sleeved jacket of the same 
blue material ; or, if it be summer, of the lighter 
weight American calico. Sonic mothers put 



i 7 4 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

sleeved bibs on their babies during feeding time, 
and these bibs (which also can be bought ready- 
made) may be substituted for the jacket. The 
point is to cover the sleeves and the front of the 
dress as well as the skirts. 

If the trousers are made amply long and full, 
so that there is a generous bagging at the knees, 
the stockings will not be worn out at the knees, 
nor will the creepers themselves give out here as 
soon as they would if the material were scant 
over this region. It is a good plan, however, in 
making up the garments, to stitch a square of 
goods on the wrong side just over the knees. 

SHOES 

The shoes bought for the baby's use during 
this period need to be of fairly strong leather. 
Here again daintiness must give way to utility. 
The constant dragging of the feet along on the 
floor wears through the toes of delicate kid shoes 
within a week. Something can be done to pro- 
tect them by making a pair of little slips of the 
blue calico. These are practically little pockets 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 175 

which cover the toes of the shoes. They are 
held in place by a strap of elastic passing round 
the back of the heel, after the fashion of a 
woman's slip rubbers. 

When the baby is thus dressed, it is evident 
that there is not much use wasting elaborately 
made dresses and skirts upon him. Indeed, the 
more clothing he has on the more awkward he 
looks and feels. He needs, however, to be 
warmly covered, because he is now exploring all 
sorts of draughty places. This is best accomplished 
by means of a thick little shirt and a flannel, 
long-sleeved gown. If he has enough flannel 
nightgowns, he can just wear one in the daytime 
and another at night. By this means each one 
has an opportunity to be well aired, while he 
himself lives continually in loose, warm gar- 
ments. If he is dressed according to the Gertrude 
plan, advocated in this book, his long-sleeved 
flannel petticoat with the corresponding under- 
garments will be exactly right for him. Other- 
wise, of course, he will need to wear a warm 
knitted skirt under his flannel gown. 



176 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

UNDERCLOTHING 

As for his legs, now so continually in contact 
with the cold floor, they must be especially 
warmly clothed. For this purpose he will need 
to wear woolen stockings, and a certain curious 
kind of under-drawers with the seat cut out. 
They are fastened at the hips by safety pins to 
the undershirt. A little square of cotton cloth 
needs to be stitched on the shirts at each side to 
take care of this pin. The 
illustration here gives the shape 
of the little leglets, which serve 
as under-drawers for the creep- 
ing baby. 

Thus protected, he is safe 
from any but the most outra- 
geous draughts. For one thing, 
his active exercise itself keeps 
him warm, and in condition to 

One Leg of Under-drawers 

for Creeping Child thrOW off any harm which 

might overtake a less active youngster. He is 
armored now for business, and just watch the 




THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 177 

joy with which he goes about it. If we could 
only retain his zest for activity, his untiring in- 
terest in everything about him, and his delight 
in his own activity, how nearly we should find 
even this commonplace old world like the king- 
dom of heaven ! 

PROGRESS OF THE MONTH 

At last, when he is nine months old, the baby 
can turn over in his crib. Now, this is a most 
useful accomplishment, because until he attained 
it, it was not safe to leave him unwatched. 
Many cases have been reported where children 
unable to turn themselves have smothered to 
death in their own cribs. Therefore it is a 
blessed relief to know that now, in all proba- 
bility, our baby can extricate himself from any 
such dilemma. To make sure of it, let us turn 
him, when he is asleep, over on his face and 
watch results. If he manages to struggle back 
to a more comfortable position, we shall know- 
that he is safe, even when left alone. 

Last month we found that he laughed a full, 

N 



i 7 8 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

joyous laugh. This month we find he delights 
in striking his hands together and then laughing 
at his own accomplishment. 

He is also more and more interested in what- 
ever goes on about him. His observation is 
more definite, and he has a greater body of ex- 
perience against which to contrast his present 
experiences. Just as he used to watch bottles 
with delight, so now he is specially interested in 
all sorts of boxes, especially those that look like 
the talcum powder box from which he has 
derived so much satisfaction. All new objects 
he regards attentively, and he watches the doors 
as they open and shut. 

SENSITIVENESS TO NOISE 

His sensitiveness to noise is very great. 
Perhaps at this period, when he is usually teeth- 
ing, it is even greater than at any other time. 
This is shown in the fact that a loud bang causes 
a number of reflex motions. A sudden noise 
of this sort will, for instance, cause him to throw 
up his arms in his sleep, although the sleep itself 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 179 

is not broken. Preyer reports that his child 
slammed down the cover of a large caraffe. 
Each time he winked and jumped, but, neverthe- 
less, his pleasure in the new sight and sound, and 
in being able to make the exciting thing happen, 
kept him slamming it over and over again. 

A practical corollary to be deduced from these 
facts is that now we shall have to be even more 
careful than before of the baby's sleeping time. 
He will need to be in a very quiet room, and as 
far as possible all noises must be kept from him. 
For these nervous actions, while not harmful in 
themselves, nevertheless exhaust to a certain 
degree his nervous vitality, and prevent his 
getting fully refreshed from his sleep at a time 
when he particularly needs it. Preyer reports 
that at this period even a loud word sometimes 
brings on winking, fright, quick breathing, 
screaming, and tears. 

EXPRESSIVE MOTIONS 

Our youngster has now acquired a new range 
of expressive motions. He shuts his eyes with- 



180 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

out screaming, but with a frowning brow, when- 
ever he has to endure something disagreeable, 
such as an older person rubbing an inquisitive 
finger over his gums in search of teeth. He 
often expresses desire by a peculiar cooing sound 
with his mouth tight shut. This is sometimes 
accompanied by an outreaching of the arms and 
hands, and its meaning is perfectly evident even 
to an uninitiated outsider. 

Although he cannot yet speak a single word, 
he understands many words, and proves this by 
his actions made in response to a question. 
When he is asked, " Where is the light ? " he 
turns his head toward it. Or, " Where is bow- 
wow ? " cc Where is papa ? " etc. Many children 
also at this stage are easily taught to point out 
their own eyes, nose, and mouth. 

At the same time he is evidently steadily 
moving on toward the time when he will be 
able to speak. His voice is becoming more 
modulated. Even his screaming is less monoto- 
nous, and it is quite easy to distinguish whether 
he is screaming from pain or anger or fright. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 181 

Whatever sounds he makes are accompanied by 
gestures and expressive movements of his fea- 
tures. Preyer's boy said " ma — ma, am — ma" 
whenever he wished to express pleasure ; also 
"a — pa, a — cha" and "ga — an — a"; and most 
children use the same or closely allied expres- 
sions. The inexperienced and proud young 
mother and father are likely to think at this stage 
that their young son is really saying mamma 
and papa with full appreciation of the meaning of 
those words ; but they are probably mistaken. 

FEAR 

Those persons who think that children who 
are never taught to fear, and who never see 
persons around them exhibiting fear, will them- 
selves be fearless, have to prove their contention 
against considerable difficulties. The baby in 
this early stage already shows unmistakable 
symptoms of fear of so irrational and absurd a 
character, as measured by adult standards, that 
it cannot have been acquired as a result cither 
of deliberate teaching or of imitation. For in- 



i82 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

stance, many children are at this stage much 
afraid of dogs ; and Preyer reports that his little 
son screamed violently on seeing some young 
pigs suckle their mother. It turned out, later, 
that he thought they were biting her. For a 
long time afterward, even after he was able to 
talk, dreams of biting pigs evidently occurred 
to him, for he would cry out in his sleep, " Go 
away, pig ! " A little girl was similarly afraid of 
doves ; and I remember my own little son be- 
ing much agitated over a chimney hole high up 
in the wall of an attic room. Preyer concludes 
that fear and courage are unequally distributed 
among children ; are often quite independent of 
training. He thinks also that they are hereditary 
and constitutional. On the whole, he is sure that 
courageous mothers tend to have courageous 
children. But it is always possible that the 
child may inherit from the other side of the 
house or from ancestors farther back, and so 
prove himself the timid child of brave parents. 
I think myself that Jack London is quite right 
psychologically when he points out, in his story 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 183 

of pre-historic man, Before Adam^ that fear was 
originally necessary to man, it being the chief 
means of keeping him on guard against the 
manifold dangers that beset him. The useful 
faculty has by now become so ingrained in hu- 
man nature that it crops up still in our children. 
This is the period when the child begins to 
creep. As we have seen, it is a most important 
stage educationally, and the activity should never 
be checked. 

STANDING ALONE 

Many children now stand for a moment by a 
chair or a table, sometimes even without support. 
If they are much urged they may even begin to 
walk a little, but much early exercise of the as 
yet undeveloped legs is by no means desirable. 
It is much better for the child to creep, defer- 
ring walking until his legs are thoroughly strong. 

The average weight of the nine-months-old 
baby is seventeen pounds. He has already got 
his lower middle front teeth, and about this time 
the upper front teeth put in an appearance. 



^^^s^^^^^^^ 


I p^/^^>^§?5^ES 






i,w»^«^J X 


i WJT^^^^^WU^ 



CHAPTER XI 

NOVEMBER 

Ten Months Old 

The first language in child and savage alike 
is gesture. This is aided by half-articulate cries 
which, as time and the child's intelligence prog- 
ress, become more and more articulate and 
definite in their meaning. The six-months- 
old child, for example, tugs at the front of his 
mother's dress when he is hungry. After a little 
he holds out his arms to be taken, or reaches 
out toward something that he wants, waves 
bye-bye, and still later on points out his own 
eyes, nose, and ears when asked to do so. 

There seems to be a universal sign language 
which, at least in its elements, is common to 
all peoples. Thus, the savage of North America 

184 



' 


% 

m 




'r^f 


M * 


1 i 

1 * ' 


^ 


Wkk 


1 J 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 185 

and the untrained deaf-mute can understand each 
other when speaking in gestures. This fact is 
often made a basis for the widely spread teach- 
ing of the so-called sign language to deaf-mutes. 
But the argument is fallacious, because the ges- 
ture language which the deaf-mutes and savages 
have in common is not the same as the highly 
conventionalized language taught in most of our 
state institutions. In the latter, for example, the 
drawing of the thumb down the cheek is the sign 
used to mean woman. This comes from the fact 
that the conventional sign language originated in 
France, where the women wear caps. Drawing 
down the thumb is meant to signify the cap 
string as it passes over the cheek. But it may 
readily be seen that such a gesture would be 
void of significance to an American Indian or to 
any other race whose women do not wear cap 
strings. 

LIMITATION OF GESTURE 

The difficulty with gesture is that it is limited 

in significance. In the nature of things it must 
apply to objects and to animal-like desires. It 



186 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

does not lend itself well to ideas of God, and 
of abstract right and wrong. Therefore, deaf- 
mute children who are restricted chiefly to the 
sign language rarely progress beyond a limited 
range of ideas. This is one of the strongest 
arguments for the teaching of speech to such 
children. It is not usually known that all deaf- 
mutes, not feeble-minded and in possession of 
sound organs of mouth and throat, may be 
taught speech. The difficulty is merely that, 
not hearing speech, they find it hard to imitate. 

Children and childlike races use more gestures 
in their speech than do adults of the more highly 
developed races. It is even said that some 
savages can hardly understand each other in 
the dark. 

However, in normal children the passage from 
gesture to speech is easy and comes almost with- 
out observation. The brain centers for speech 
and for the right hand lie close together, and 
the anatomical appearance is as if the use of 
either would tend to stimulate the other. As 
a matter of fact, in the training of feeble-minded 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 187 

children the development of the hand has been 
found of great value in the development of 
speech and of other nearly-related brain centers. 



ARTICULATE CRIES 



Gesture, as we have just said, is accompanied 
from the beginning with more or less articulate 
cries. Significant cries are not limited to the 
human being. Buckman points out that fowls 
have twelve or more different cries by which 
they warn and guide each other ; cats, six ; rooks, 
six; and monkeys, two hundred or more, — 
almost a language in itself. Miss Tanner adds 
that idiots who cannot learn to speak or under- 
stand words can be taught some things merely by 
tone and gesture. 

During the first months the baby limits him- 
self almost wholly to vowel sounds, especially 
•#, ody a. The first consonant is usually an 
indistinct hard g> sounded partly in the throat 
and partly through the nose. Then comes ///, 
p y d y /, and k. Thus is arrived at the char- 
acteristic "a-goo." He tends also to double and 



188 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

repeat syllables as savages do. Thus, cc goo-goo- 
goo. " The combination " ma-ma-ma " is usually 
the first. Buckman has an ingenious theory to 
account for this fact. He agrees with Vierordt 
that a usually signifies pleasure, and a signifies 
pain. Therefore, very naturally he thinks the 
broad a, used when the child is hungry and in 
pain, becomes a way of calling for his mother, 
who relieves hunger and pain. Presently he 
adds to it one of his earliest consonants, m> 
and then works his little trick of doubling 
syllables ; and there you have " mamma." The 
root of this word is found in Sanskrit, Greek, 
and Latin, as well as in our modern languages. 

IMITATIVE SOUNDS 

It is during the second six months that the 
child usually begins to imitate the sounds made 
by others. Sometimes he achieves remarkable 
success in this effort ; at other times he makes 
ludicrous failures. He imitates vowels more 
easily than consonants. To appreciate the diffi- 
culty of his task, let the mother herself 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 189 

undertake to try to make some of the ex- 
traordinary noises which he manages to make. 
She will find some of the clicks and gutturals 
(which, by the bye, are much like the gutturals 
used by savages, the Arabs, and the Hebrews) 
quite sufficiently difficult of imitation, and will 
thereafter enter more sympathetically into her 
child's efforts to imitate her. 

TRYING TO WALK 

Toward the end of the first year the baby's 
attention seems to be switched from talking to 
walking. He gives his whole mind now to the 
effort to gain control of his newly acquired 
powers of locomotion. Usually these efforts 
put a complete stop to all further progress in 
the acquisition of speech, and sometimes he 
even forgets much of that which he has already 
acquired. But after he has mastered walking 
he regains his speech, and from that on his 
progress is very rapid. 

The order of his intellectual advancement 
seems to be that he first understands speech, 



i 9 o THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

then attempts to imitate it, then walks, and 
still later talks. 

The child's first speech is so surprising and 
charming that it is no wonder we have formed 
the habit of imitating it and using " baby talk." 
But in doing so Miss Tanner declares that we 
hinder the child's speech by limiting ourselves 
to him. He ought to have put before him for 
imitation perfect and distinct models of speech. 
Even with such reiterated examples he is likely to 
find the matter of talking quite difficult enough. 
But if his examples themselves are poor and 
incomplete, how much greater his difficulty ! 

LEARNING TO SPEAK 

As to the time in which a child ought to be 
able to learn to speak with a fair degree of 
fluency and accuracy, accounts differ. There 
may be wide variations without abnormality. 
While it is true that failure to speak within a 
reasonable period is one of the diagnostic signs 
of some forms of under-development of the 
brain, and of some diseases, yet many of the 
closest observers of children say that we cannot 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 191 

rightly conclude from this sign alone that a 
child is abnormal, unless he does not speak by 
the time he is five years old. But, of course, 
as we all know from ordinary observation, most 
children speak fairly well at two years of age, 
and with considerable fluency at three years of 
age. Perez says that " the more intelligent 
a child is the less he uses words, and the more 
necessary it is for him that words should signify 
something to him if he is to learn them ; and 
this is why he only learns words in proportion 
as he gains ideas by objects. " This pronounce- 
ment, made by undoubted authority, offers con- 
siderable consolation to the parents of children 
who are late in learning to speak. As for 
parents of children who talk when they are a 
little over a year old there is no consolation 
for them. But, indeed, they don't need any, 
being already puffed up with pride ! What 
they do need is a friendly warning to make 
sure that their child is not being pushed ahead 
too fast, for precocity is, as we are learning to 
know, a danger signal. 



192 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



IS IT REAL TEMPER 



The world of mothers is divided into two fac- 
tions in the discussion of this important question. 
There are those who think that the baby shows 
real temper within the first few months of life ; 
and not only that, but that he can be taught by 
pain of various kinds to control his temper. 
There are others who think that genuine temper 
and self-will is impossible before the end of the 
first year, and that, therefore, any attempt at dis- 
cipline is quite out of place before the close of 
this period. Now let us see what the scientific 
child observers, who have carefully avoided tak- 
ing any side in this practical controversy, have to 
say as to the baby's temper. 

Darwin observed that on the eighth day his 
child wrinkled his brow and frowned when cry- 
ing, as if in anger. Perez noticed that a child in 
the second month pushed away with a frown dis- 
tasteful objects. He adds that in the fourth 
month anger was unmistakably shown, the face 
and head were red, and the cry was irritable. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 193 

This anger is caused at first by delay in supply- 
ing food ; but two or three months later will be 
called out by any thwarting of desire, such as the 
dropping of a toy. Commenting on these facts, 
Miss Tanner remarks : — 

" Anger at this early age, it must be noted, is 
simply the instinctive rebelling against pain. It 
is wholly unreasonable and is best dealt with by 
diverting the child's attention if the deprivation 
is for the child's good. As the child gets a little 
older, especially if it is a boy, he is likely to vent 
his anger by beating the person or thing that 
offends him, or by throwing things at them. 
Here, also, until a child can be reasoned with, 
diversion of attention and the final securing of 
an expression of affection is the wisest method 
of treatment. 

CAUSES OF ANGER 

"At best only a few of the causes of anger can 

be enumerated. There is, in the first place, what 

may be called an irascible disposition, with which 

some seem to be born. Disappointments and 

o 



i 9 4 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

vexations which others would hardly notice result 
in violent outbursts of temper. Personal pecul- 
iarities of speech, gait, dress, — almost anything, 
in fact, — may lead to a hate that is almost mur- 
derous in its vindictiveness. When a child is 
so unfortunate in its disposition, only the most 
constant, temperate, kindly training in self-con- 
trol will help him. 

" There are, in some cases, physical conditions 
causing constant irritation which are reflected 
in this bad temper. Hence parents should first 
of all ascertain whether the child is healthy. 
Fatigue is also a common cause of irritability." 

DESTRUCTIVE TANTRUMS 

In children who are eight months old or more, 
there appears sometimes a violent destructive 
anger very hard to reckon with. In these emo- 
tional paroxysms the child destroys anything 
within his reach, screaming meanwhile at the top 
of his lungs. In such activity the love of pro- 
ducing a change is undoubtedly mingled with 
emotional excitement. Hysterical women some- 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 195 

times exhibit the same symptoms. I knew per- 
sonally a woman prominent in club work, the 
president of a certain federation, who, during fits 
of emotional excitement, would tear down cur- 
tains and smash furniture and china. In her it 
was plainly to be seen that passion operated as a 
sort of moral intoxication ; and the same thing is 
true with children. In their ordinary moments 
they feel themselves weak. Their desires, how- 
ever strong, cannot always take effect. But 
under the influence of passion they feel momen- 
tarily strong, and this delights them. 

A child in such a tantrum is temporarily 
insane. The tantrum itself is a species of emo- 
tional insanity. There is certainly no use argu- 
ing with him, and still less use in threatening. 
The only thing to do is to keep as still and cool 
as possible yourself, and to act promptly. You 
have the advantage of your size : make use of it. 
Pick him up, carry him to a quiet place where 
there is nothing he can injure, and leave him 
there. Solitude and silence are his best helpers. 



196 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



PUNISHMENT 



Striking and punishment are worse than useless. 
Usually they do not even succeed in quieting the 
child. But if they do, you have merely substi- 
tuted the base emotion of fear for the emotion of 
anger — and that is little gained. In most cases 
you will find that the real truth is that the child 
has made you angry. You have been overcome 
by the contagion of his evil state, instead of over- 
coming evil with good. 

Many mothers fail of utter honesty with them- 
selves in this matter. They often pretend that 
their excited feelings were not anger, but only a 
zealous wish for the child's welfare. But God, 
who sees beneath our feeble pretenses, knows 
that when we large, strong women strike swiftly, 
and with something of enjoyment in the act, our 
little children, we are angry! We are in a temper 
which has in it more of moral turpitude than the 
hasty temper of the child himself. I do not be- 
lieve, nor can any one make me believe, that a 
woman ever struck a child in perfect calmness of 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 197 

spirit, her heart filled with love. I used to think 
that I could do it ; and I used to fool myself 
into thinking that I had done it; but now that 
years have brought comparative calmness I know 
better. 

REMOVING TEMPTATIONS 

The thing we ought to try to do is, first, to 
avoid as far as possible all occasions for such dis- 
play of temper, for it is very easy to form in a 
child the habit of emotional uncontrol. Espe- 
cially is this so when a child inherits from either 
father or mother that weakness which we call 
quick temper. We need to establish a habit of 
poise, and of quiet, and therefore to remove as 
far as possible all temptations. 

This does not mean at all that the child 
should have his own way in everything for fear 
of an outbreak of temper. On the contrary, he 
must never be allowed to feel that he gains any- 
thing by a display of temper, except quiet and 
solitude. It means simply that we should look 
ahead ; and when we know, for example, that 
being lifted suddenly out of a warm bath into a 



198 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

comparatively cold room brings on crying, we 
shall try to have something to distract his atten- 
tion, like a piece of candy to pop into his mouth 
at the psychological moment. Or when we 
know that he becomes restless and irritable when 
his meals are long delayed, we will put ourselves 
out to see to it that they are not delayed at all. 
And so with other recognized causes of bad 
temper. 

QUIET AND SOLITUDE 

But when, on the other hand, the temper is 
on in full force, we must see to it that the child 
does not get what he is screaming for. Even 
if it is right in itself, it is not right to let him 
have it while he is screaming, lest he come to 
think that letting go of himself is a good way 
of getting what he wants. 

Physical motion of all sorts forms a good vent 
for such nervous and emotional excitement. If 
the child can be induced to run out of doors, or 
can be given a hammer to pound with, or in any 
other way can be led to work off the nervous 
excitement through muscular activity, his temper 
will evaporate harmlessly. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 199 

The cures for temper, then, are : First, the 
avoidance of provocation ; second, distracted 
attention ; third, active physical exercise ; and 
fourth, if all these fail, solitude and quiet until 
the storm has blown itself out. 

FALLING OBJECTS 

Our decision, then, as to the controversy 
stated in the beginning of this article, is that the 
baby has a real temper long before he is a year 
old, but that he is not able to control it himself. 
As we see, from the Progress of the Months he 
has not yet built, in brain and nervous system, 
the mechanism which enables us grown-up people 
to deny ourselves the yielding to an impulse. In 
psychological terms, he is not yet able to inhibit 
(or forbid) his impulses. Of course, no amount 
of punishment will build this mechanism for him. 
We have, then, to wait and, meanwhile, to help 
him. 

PROGRESS OF THE MONTH 

About the tenth month the child discovers his 
own body as distinct from other bodies ; that IS, 



200 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

he begins to make this discovery. He is not 
perfectly sure of the fact until he is almost two 
years old. Preyer, among his careful records of 
his own little son, makes the following comment 
upon this fact : — 

" How little he understands, even after the 
first year of his life has passed, the difference 
between the parts of his own body and foreign 
objects is shown also in some strange experiments 
that the child conducted quite independently. 
He sits by me at the table and strikes very often 
and rapidly with his hands successive blows upon 
the table, at first gently, then hard ; then, with the 
right hand alone, hard ; next, suddenly strikes 
himself with the same hand on the mouth ; 
then he holds his hand to his mouth for a while, 
strikes the table again with the right hand, and 
then on a sudden strikes his own head (above the 
ear). The whole performance gave exactly the 
impression of his having for the first time noticed 
that it is one thing to strike one's self, one's own 
hard head, and another thing to strike a foreign 
hard object (forty-first week)." 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 201 

Now, for the first time, also, the child looks at 
an object when it falls to the floor. Last month he 
dropped it out of his hand and seemed to be sur- 
prised at its disappearance, but he did not follow 
it with his eyes unless it moved very slowly. 
But this month his greater control over the 
muscles of his eyes, and his growing powers of 
reasoning from cause to effect, lead him to follow 
the falling object and notice where it lies. This 
fact is the secret of that trick which so much 
annoys mother and nurses at this period, i.e. 
the trick of throwing down almost everything 
that is put into his hands. He is really making 
a series of experiments in doing this, and is dis- 
covering what each human being has to discover 
afresh for himself; namely, that bodies are heavy, 
and fall if not supported. 

CAUSALITY 

At this time the child turns his head in the 
direction of any new sound that he hears. This 
is especially marked in the quick turning toward 

the sound of his mother's voice. This mav look 



202 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

like a slight thing, but it gives evidence of great 
intellectual advance. For the child is evidently 
reasoning thus : cc Here is a sound. Every 
sound I have heard was accompanied by some- 
thing moving. Something must be moving 
now. What is it ? I will look around and 
see," 

Preyer has another instance to relate in illus- 
tration of this trait : he tells how his child when 
ten months old struck several times with a spoon 
upon a plate. It happened accidentally, while he 
was doing this, that he touched the plate with 
the hand that was free ; the sound w T as dulled, 
and the child noticed the difference. He now 
took the spoon in the other hand, struck with it 
on the plate, dulled the sound again, and so on. 
In the evening this experiment was renewed, with 
a like result. Evidently the function of causality 
had emerged in some strength, for it prompted 
the experiment. The cause of the dulling of the 
sound by the hand — was it in the hand or in the 
plate ? The other hand had the same dulling 
effect, so the cause was not lodged with the one 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 203 

hand. Pretty nearly in this fashion the child 
must have interpreted his sound-impression, and 
this at a time when he did not know a single word 
of language. 

BITING 

Biting begins to appear about this time, and as 
the child has now four teeth, the biting is dis- 
tinctly effectual, — as many a nursing mother 
knows to her cost ! This action is as instinctive 
as sucking. If the baby is given bread, he 
promptly proceeds to crunch it with his sharp 
little teeth, without being instructed or seeing 
any one whose action he imitates. 

EYES 

His eyes still converge a little at times, and 
continue to do so until the twentieth month. 
But it is evident that the more he uses his eves 
with conscious purpose the more they tend to 
move evenly in the same direction. He looks 
more often at objects connected with his food 
than anything else. The intensity of his atten- 
tion may easily be guessed by the more or less 



2o 4 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

complete fixation of his eyes when gazing at any 
object. 

HANDS 

As to his hands, he has already made great 
progress in the skillful use of his thumb and 
fingers. He shows it particularly when tearing 
papers, for he is already able to pick up from 
the floor very small shreds. But if any of these 
pieces of paper get in his mouth, his efforts to 
get them out again with his own fingers are very 
awkward, showing that touch without sight is as 
yet uncertain. With sight, however, it is already 
definite enough to enable him to pass a very 
small object, such as a thread or hair, from one 
hand to the other. 

He gains also in the power to use his arms, 
and may now be taught to wave bye-bye in 
imitation, although he does not yet understand 
the significance of the gesture. 

SELF-CONTROL 

The voluntary impulses are now rapidly grow- 
ing. The baby is even able at times to forbid a 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 205 

reflex nervous action. You will remember that 
reflex acts, such as the winking of an eyelid 
before an expected blow, are quite involuntary. 
Adults gradually teach themselves to control 
most of these reflexes ; but before the tenth 
month babies cannot do so. The machinery 
which would enable him, for instance, to resist 
the urgence of bladder or bowels is now only 
beginning to be built in his brain. Therefore up 
to this time it is perfectly useless to try to teach 
him habits of self-control in this regard. A 
puppy may be trained when three months old; 
but not a baby. As we have seen in our studies 
of precocity, this is because the baby has so 
many more things to teach his brain than the 
puppy has that all he can do for a long time is 
just to start the good work. He can't finish any 
of it. So, no matter what nurses and neighbors 
may say about phenomenal babies who use the 
chair from the beginning, don't believe a word oi 
it ! Let your youngster alone until he is at least 
ten months old. Then observe his natural 
intervals and conform your training to them. 



206 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

Soon he will begin to announce his needs by 
restlessness. This means that there is a struggle 
going on between his new-born powers of self- 
control and his well-established reflex impulses. 
The struggle cannot be maintained long, and 
the mother must not expect it, but must be 
quick to offer assistance. There is no need of 
punishment, for the child is glad to welcome 
such help as this. 

SITTING UP IN BATH 

About this time the youngster, who has long 
been making efforts to sit alone in his bath, at 
last accomplishes his object. He has long been 
able, of course, to sit up on his mother's 
lap, but that is because her body aids him in 
his efforts at equilibrium. It is different in the 
bath, where the smooth surface of the tub offers 
him the least possible support. However, he at 
last succeeds, and can now maintain his sitting 
posture for some minutes without support, 
so long as his attention is not distracted. This 
is one of his chief studies for this month, and he 
usually masters it for life. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 207 

WALKING 

When he is held up under the arms so that 
his feet touch the floor, he makes walking mo- 
tions. At first his feet cross over once in a while, 
and he makes sidewise steps. As neither of these 
acts bring any unpleasant consequences, the psy- 
chologists are puzzled to know why he struggles 
not to repeat them, and keeps on trying to move 
forward in a straight line. He soon succeeds in 
this, and manages to make very good straight- 
away steps, although he lifts his foot too high and 
stamps too hard. His interest in this activity is so 
great that his crying can often be stopped merely 
by holding him so that he can walk forward. 

SPEECH 

As for his speech, it is evident that he uses 
more syllables and varies them better when he 
is left all alone and is chattering away to him- 
self, than when some one is noticing him, and 
talking back to him. In this we sec again that 
spontaneous activity, the mere unconscious use 



208 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

of the organs of speech, is at once more per- 
fect and of a lower order than voluntary, 
conscious use of the same organ. That is, 
when the baby is merely playing with his 
tongue and throat, gurgling, and cooing, and 
smacking his lips, and uttering various sounds, 
this performance, which does not require any 
particular effort of the will, is more perfect of 
its kind than his attempts at imitation. When 
he says C£ ma-ma-ma-ma-ma ) ,, for instance, just 
opening and shutting his lips, his enunciation 
is more perfect than when he tries to say the 
same word in imitation of his mother. Yet 
already these meaningless babblings are begin- 
ning to come under the control of his will, for 
he tries hard to imitate those who speak to 
him, and he yields the closest attention to the 
effort. The latest researches into the great 
problem of the relation of the brain to the mind 
show that such faculties as, for instance, the 
speech centers, are actually built up in the brain 
structure by the will of the individual. In these 
early efforts to imitate speech we see the will 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 



209 



of the little child actually building in his brain 
that power of uttered speech which beyond 
all other faculties distinguishes man from 
animals. 

The baby already has four teeth, and no 
more are due now until the fifteenth month. 
His weight should be about seventeen pounds, 
and his height about twenty-seven inches. 





CHAPTER XII 

DECEMBER 

One Year Old 

WEANING 

At the close of the first year we have to 
face the problem of weaning the baby. But if 
we have been in truth wise, we have already made 
considerable preparation for this event — did 
you think I was going to say ordeal ? It used 
to be an ordeal to mother, child, and the whole 
family ; but it need not be one, if you will ex- 
ercise a little common sense, and take a little 
time in which to make the change. 

First, let's take a look at the old-fashioned 
way of weaning. The mother seizes upon the 
opportune visit of some near friend or relative, 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 211 

and decides then and there, with scant reference 
to the baby's health and comfort, or, indeed, to 
her own, to have the weaning. To this solemn 
and uncomfortable rite three days and nights are 
devoted. Without warning or preparation the 
poor baby, full of his own affairs, very busy try- 
ing to walk and talk, is suddenly deprived of the 
chief joy and sustenance of his life. Of course 
he howls, stretching out appealing hands to his 
mother whenever she comes in sight. There- 
fore she keeps mostly away, and the forlorn 
youngster has to put up with a poor substi- 
tute. Any one, the most devoted grandmother, 
even, is a poor substitute for mother in a 
baby's eyes. Then his stomach begins to 
bother him, and strange discomforts pervade 
his abdominal regions, because, of course, he 
is partaking of unfamiliar food. But when he 
cries he doesn't get mamma, and a warm 
snuggle against a sweet breast full of comtort, 
but a dry old auntie or grandma, with some 
peppermint in a spoon ! And at night he 
sleeps with it — with this odious person who 



212 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

has taken the place of his mother ! No wonder 
he howls and frets, and sometimes makes himself 
ill. Scarcely a greater grief could befall a year- 
old baby than this sudden loss of his beloved 
comforter and source of food supply. He 
doesn't know that he will ever get it back again 
— and indeed he will only get it back in part. 
Such weaning is to him poverty, famine, and 
sudden death, all rolled into one pain and bewil- 
derment. 

MISERY FOR TWO 

Meanwhile, the young mother is going 
about with bursting breasts and a yearning 
heart. She tries to be deaf to his cries ; but 
in truth she wants him almost as much as he 
wants her. To be sure, she can relieve the 
painful pressure of the milk by using a breast- 
pump ; but what a substitute is this harsh thing 
for the baby's soft, strong little mouth and push- 
ing, warm, snuggly body ! She rubs on Bella- 
donna ointment, and in spite of bandages, pump, 
and medicine, drips milk almost as plentifully as 
the baby drips tears. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 213 

Such weaning is a wicked and senseless per- 
formance, full of pain for both mother and 
child, and likely to give rise to serious mischief. 
A disordered digestion on the part of the baby, 
and consequent retardation of his growth and in- 
terference with his normal activities, is almost 
sure to follow ; and some babies even become 
ill. As for the mother, she may get an abscess 
in her breast or lay the foundations for a future 
tumor or cancer. 

Now, having looked on that picture, look 
on this. This is the right way to wean a 
baby : — 

THE RIGHT WAY 

Gradually in the last two or three months 
he has been getting extra things to eat — a 
soft-boiled egg once in a while, or milk 
toast, or baked potato with cream, or a bit 
of bacon to suck. He has tried a little oat- 
meal water or barley water. The oatmeal he 
gets when his bowels are too tight, the bar- 
ley when they are too loose. What is neces- 
sary is just to increase this feeding — very 



214 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

gently and slowly. What has been irregular 
now becomes regular. 

He has first one meal a day which is not drawn 
from your breasts. You can tell, by watching 
his bowels, his sleep, his general serenity, which 
foods agree with him. Keep this up for a week 
at least, and for longer if the new food still 
shows signs of imperfect assimilation. Then, 
by the time this rule has been established, your 
breasts will have ceased to swell and throb at 
the hour when you used to nurse him, but at 
which he is now fed. If omitting one meal a 
day gives you this discomfort, think how you'd 
suffer if you suddenly omitted all the meals ! 



GRADUAL WEANING 



Next week, feed him twice a day. The week 
after, three times. And so on. This is as fast 
as you can go. Indeed, it is better to go slower, 
and make the change only every two weeks. 
The whole weaning is safest and happiest when 
it spreads over a period of three months. After 
all, that is none too long a time to accustom 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 215 

the baby to such a change of nourishment. 
But if there is any special occasion why you 
should hurry, you can try changing one meal 
every week. But even then you must watch 
carefully to make sure you are not going too 
fast. 

WRONG WAYS 

As for the kind of food to wean on, there 
are a few " don'ts " to be disposed of before 
we pass to more positive instructions. Dont 
change to any kind of bottle food. If you 
do, you'll have a second weaning to go through 
by and by. Change at once to spoon-fed 
foods, and no bottle at night. 

Keep shifting along the night nursing until 
it coincides with the early morning nursing. 
This can be the last to go, because it is the 
one for which other food can be least conven- 
iently substituted. After he has learned to eat 
heartily and digest his food well, vou can give 
him a piece of bacon to suck in the early morn- 
ing instead of nursing him. Anyway, he will 



216 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

soon be so intensely interested and tired with 
his play, that he will sleep right through the 
night, and until almost time for you to get up. 

Don't change to any single special food. The 
baby now needs variety. Advertisements to the 
contrary notwithstanding, there is no prepared 
food which meets all the needs of a growing 
child. Follow his appetite somewhat, and give 
him the stimulus of variety. 

Don't have him sit at the table with the family, 
where he is fed all sorts of things, no one knows 
how much. It's such fun to feed a baby that 
he tempts the sternest father or even big brother 
to indulge him beyond reasonable bounds. 

If he must come into the dining room at all 
— it is much better that he should not, if he 
has a nurse — let him have his own little low 
table and kindergarten chair, close beside his 
mother. From that lowly place he cannot see 
the tempting food spread out above, and he 
takes with joy whatever is given him. This is 
a good plan to follow out for the first four years. 
As other children come they can join this little 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 217 

party, only graduating to the large table when 
they have reached years of fair discretion and 
decent table manners. 

Now as to the articles of food he may have : 

FOODS FOR WEANLING 

Milk, of course. Do not too quickly yield 
to a supposed idiosyncrasy against it. It is true 
that some children cannot take it; but they are 
a very small percentage of the total number of 
children. Mothers who do not like milk them- 
selves often give up very quickly the effort to 
make their children like it — thus laying up 
all sorts of trouble for the future. The child 
who likes milk can be well fed almost anywhere, 
but the child who dislikes it finds half the usual 
soups, vegetables, and desserts spoiled for him 
by its presence. If your baby does not like 
straight milk, try giving it to him warmed and 
sweetened. Or make him a cup of " cambric 
tea" — that is, hot water, sugar, and cream. 
Be careful not to use too much sugar. Sugar* 
of-milk, to be had in packages from the drug 



2i 8 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

stores, is better for the weanling than cane or 
beet sugar. It does not ferment in the stomach. 

Next, soft-boiled eggs. Or very hard-boiled 
eggs, cooked at least fifteen minutes. 

Next toast, buttered, and wet with a little hot 
water ; or milk toast ; or toast with a little 
platter-gravy on it ; or toast with a soft poached 
egg on it. 

Next, Educator crackers, or other hard, dry 
crackers that will not choke him with crumbs. 

Bacon, boiled, not fried. Let him hold a 
strip and suck it. Being boiled, it will not 
break off in his mouth. It is a wonderful 
appetizer and full of nourishment. Other meats, 
in small quantities, are best given only after 
the appearance of the double teeth. 

FRUITS AND VEGETABLES 

As for vegetables, he can have baked pota- 
toes, with a little cream on them. Fried pota- 
toes he must never touch until he is three years 
old at least. Boiled potatoes are permissible, 
but not so good as baked. Potatoes must never 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 219 

become a staple article of diet. They make 
neither bone nor muscle, but chiefly fat. 

The usual breakfast cereals that cook up into 
porridges are all right ; but not the flakes nor 
puffed grains. The baby cannot chew these, 
and when he does not choke on them he swal- 
lows them whole, and they go right through 
his little system, irritating as they go. Oat- 
meal is excellent when there is no looseness 
of the bowels. It is not good in hot weather. 

As for fruits, he can have a baked apple, the 
seeds and skin carefully removed, and orange 
juice, and small quantities of the pulp of per- 
fectly ripe, perfectly fresh, raw fruits, such as 
apples, peaches, and bananas. These should be 
scraped with a spoon, and fed to him only a very 
little at a time, — say three teaspoonfuls. They, 
too, are excellent appetizers. Babies love ba- 
nanas, and this love may be safely gratified if the 
mother makes it a rule never to give them the 
fruit itself to hold, but feeds it a little bit at B 
time, scraped fine in a spoon. This fruit must 
be perfectly ripe, but not at all overripe. The 



220 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

indigestibility of the banana consists in the fact 
that it requires saliva for its digestion and yet 
slides down the throat so easily without chewing 
that it is rarely mingled with this necessary 
fluid. 

It is a good idea to plan the weanling's meals 
as carefully as you do those of the rest of the 
family. I always write down my menus for the 
day in a little blank book kept for the purpose ; 
and I used to write out the babies' meals by 
themselves. Thus I secured for them an 
attractive and wholesome variety. 

TIME OF WEANING 

As for the time of weaning, it should be about 
the close of the first year. Unless the mother 
is ill, or there is some serious trouble with her 
milk, weaning ought never to be attempted 
before this time. A slight, temporary derange- 
ment of the milk is not enough to justify wean- 
ing. Of course, another pregnancy necessitates 
it, for no woman can nourish properly two babies 
at once. However, the old-fashioned idea that a 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 221 

woman is not very likely to become pregnant 
while she is nursing is founded on fact, and 
constitutes another reason for not weaning before 
the close of the first year. 

But some women carry this idea much too far, 
and nurse the baby almost into the third year in 
the hope of escaping pregnancy. This is alto- 
gether a mistake. Such prolonged suckling is 
not good for either mother or child ; and it will 
not accomplish the object she has in view. It 
will simply make her a thin, pale, dragged-out 
woman with a pale, flabby, fretful baby in her 
arms. 

If the weaning begins at one year, as here 
advised, and lasts three months, the mother will 
gradually cease nursing, will recover her tone, 
and, when the baby is fifteen months old, will be 
rosy and healthy, with an equally rosy and 
healthy baby. Let's hope they'll live happy 
ever after — for they've certainly had a good 
start. 



222 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

LEARNING TO WALK 

When the baby began to creep we noticed how 
his horizon had widened, and how many more 
experiences he had with which to build up his 
growing personality. Now we see that walking 
is as much of an advance over creeping as creep- 
ing was over the previous stage in which the 
child had to be carried about by his mother. It 
is so largely because the upright position sets the 
child's hands free. He can not only go to what 
he wants, but can feel of it, and carry it about 
with him from place to place. In creeping, of 
course, this was not possible. When he gains 
this power he eats and sleeps better, his general 
health improves, and he is sweeter tempered. 
This fact, together with a number of others con- 
firmatory of the same truth, shows that active 
exercise of all the powers is necessary to health 
and happiness. 

In beginning to walk the baby holds on at 
first by the wall or furniture. He has already 
probably had considerable practice in moving 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 223 

over the floor as if walking, although his weight 
has been partly supported by some one who 
holds him under the arms. The next stage is 
his attempt to get along by himself, substituting 
the wall or a chair for the missing human hand. 
Very independent babies when they first find 
that they can get about in this way resent the 
too-efficient assistance of the mother. They 
want to be able to get about by themselves, and 
this desire, while it often makes the mother ache 
with suppressed helpfulness, should, nevertheless, 
be encouraged. 

Long after he walks by holding on to chairs 
and walls the little fellow will drop on all fours 
and creep over open spaces. 

PUSHING A CHAIR 

Presently he learns to push a chair ahead of 
him, and for this purpose nothing is so good as 
a strong, well-built child's rocking chair, for the 
rockers enable it to slide smoothly over the floor, 
and its height is about right for the little fellow, 
who still maintains a half-recumbent attitude. 



224 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

As he pushes the chair about, his fat legs bravely 
straddling, it is evident that this mode of pro- 
gression now is just about halfway between 
creeping and walking. The baby carriage, too, 
is a great help to him at this time. He can take 
hold of the handles, push it ahead of him, and at 
the same time maintain his own balance ; but the 
easily moving wheels tend to go so swiftly that a 
restraining hand is necessary to keep him from 
bumping his ambitious little nose. 

In trying to go entirely alone the fear of falling 
hinders many children. I have never been able 
to agree with those people who think that it 
does not matter how many bumps a child may 
get in his first attempts at walking. If he is too 
often hurt, it stands to reason that he will become 
timid and afraid of venturing again, and thus 
these early falls may lead to an unnecessarily late 
development of his powers of locomotion. 

FEAR AS AN OBSTACLE 

Often a child who is really able to walk by 
himself is still so fearful of falling that he will 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 225 

not attempt it. He will hold on to one finger, 
exerting almost no pressure upon it, and walk 
bravely ; but he will not even attempt to go 
alone. Miss Tanner tells of one little girl who 
had always held on to her mother's dress while 
walking. One day she seized the scallops of 
her own skirt and walked bravely off, perform- 
ing a feat closely analogous to the famous one 
of raising one's self by one's boot straps. Pro- 
fessor Hall's daughter chanced to walk alone 
for the first time when she had a pair of her 
father's cuffs slipped over her arms, and for 
several days she could walk very well with them 
on, but would not stir a step without them. 
When a child is not being constantly urged to 
walk, it is not infrequent for him to take his 
first independent steps without knowing it, in 
his eagerness to get something that he wants. 
But as soon as he realizes that he is going alone, 
while he may be very proud of himself, he 
promptly falls, and may not try again for sonic 
days or even weeks. Then suddenly he walks 
alone again, and each day makes large gains, 
Q 



226 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

until, in a week or so, walking is preferred to 
any other mode of locomotion. 

DATE OF WALKING 

As to the age when children first walk alone, 
accounts vary, and undoubtedly perfectly normal 
children vary also. Mrs. Hall reports that her 
boy stood alone for a minute in his thirty-eighth 
week, and in the forty-eighth pulled himself to 
a chair and stood for five minutes. Preyer's 
boy walked in the sixty-eighth week, and others, 
whose records have been kept, walked at the 
twelfth month, the thirtieth, and even the thirty- 
sixth month! 

In teaching the baby to walk, we have, of 
course, to lend him every intelligent assistance 
in our power. We want to save him falls as 
much as we can without interfering with his 
freedom of experiment ; but we do not want to 
urge him to walk before he is entirely ready. 
If he has betrayed any delicacy, it is better even 
to check this activity than to stimulate it. If, 
for example, he has not got his teeth properly, 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 227 

or if he got them very much too soon ; if he 
is undersized and below the normal weight, it 
will not do to allow him to walk even so soon 
as he wants to himself. This is because his 
bones have evidently not been growing as they 
should. There has been some failure of nutri- 
tion ; and walking under these circumstances 
may lead to bowlegs and knock-knees. Ex- 
tremely fat and heavy babies, too, ought to be 
checked somewhat, if the fat is soft and the skin 
pale. But if, on the other hand, the child is 
obviously full of vigor, with a good color, and 
four teeth, he may well be encouraged to do as 
much walking as he likes, even though he be 
pretty heavy. The new exercise will of itself 
tend to reduce the unnecessary amount of fat. 

Some writers say that no one need be worried 
over the baby's failure to walk before he is 
three years old, but I should myself take alarm 
if he did not walk by the time he was two years 
old, especially if his general health showed any 
signs of being below par. There is no harm 
in consulting a doctor in regard to the baby's 



228 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

condition, and it may be that the retarded de- 
velopment is due to some unsuspected weakness 
which calls for remedies and extra care. 

IRREGULAR ADVANCE 

It must not be supposed, however, that 
growth in the ability to walk proceeds in a 
perfectly even fashion from standing alone to 
complete mastery of legs and back. On the 
contrary, it is almost always more or less irregu- 
lar. It may be interrupted by the acquisition 
of speech, as we have found that the acquisition 
of speech may be interrupted by the effort at 
walking. Or any strong absorbing interest may 
put a stop to it temporarily. Sometimes it 
stops for no apparent reason. Perhaps it may 
be that the child's store of nervous energy has 
been overdrawn, and a rest is required before 
he lays up enough more to start him going again. 
We do not need to worry about any of these 
fluctuations ; but we will, of course, watch every 
possible symptom of approaching trouble. We 
will notice whether the child is languid, whether 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 229 

he hangs his head and droops, whether he eats 
well and sleeps well. If any of these signs 
appear, we shall take him to a doctor, for some 
childish disease may be impending which early 
care may avert. But if, on the other hand, he 
seems perfectly cheerful and well, but simply 
does not get ahead with his walking, we shall 
know that he is taking a well-earned rest, and 
we will not trouble ourselves further about the 
change in him. Probably, when he takes to 
walking again, he will surprise us by his rapid 
progress. 





CHAPTER XIII 

SUMMARY OF THE YEAR'S ACCOMPLISH- 
MENTS 

LEARNING TO TALK 

Now that the first year of life is completed, 
let us look back and see what the baby has 
accomplished. First we will take up the matter 
of speech. We have found that in the beginning 
our youngster merely babbled without any atten- 
tion or significance. These babblings were just 
a sort of gymnastics of the vocal organs. He 
seemed to do it only because he could. Yet 
even in these almost unconscious sounds we 
have been able to trace the steady develop- 
ment of his intellectual powers. For a while 
at first he uttered only vowel sounds, yet later 
to these he joined consonants in their order of 
difficulty, thus making syllables. Having once 

230 






THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 231 

found out how to make a syllable, he repeated 
it, thus making such combinations as " ma-ma," 
"pa-pa," "a-goo," and many others. Although 
we have agreed to consider some of these duplica- 
tions, such as "ma-ma" and "pa-pa," as actual 
words, uttered with intention, they are not so 
in reality when the baby first utters them. 

But as soon as he makes these sounds those 
about him begin to speak them, too, and to urge 
him to repeat them by imitation. This is a long 
step in advance of the original aimless utterance, 
and it is a long time before the baby is able to 
accomplish it. As soon as he does he has be- 
come to a certain extent conscious master of the 
elements of speech. 

ASSOCIATION OF SOUNDS AND IDEAS 

The next step is that he learns to associate 
certain sounds with certain acts or objects. He 
does this by means of constant repetition. For 
instance, his mother calls herself mam ma, is 
pointed to as mamma, and is called by every 
one mamma ; and by and by this first, easiest- 



232 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

uttered word becomes attached to the idea of 
mother, and, as Buckman points out, is made 
to cover the whole idea of the person who re- 
lieves hunger, or pain, or even the relief itself. 

With most children the first word is "mamma," 
and the next, oddly enough, is " kra " or " ka- 
ka," uttered with a sort of a guttural snarl and 
a disgusted raising of the upper lip. It is used 
to express disgust, and as such appears in a num- 
ber of languages as a root word. In Greek, 
for instance, the word kakos means bad. " da- 
da" is another early word. It seems to mean 
" there-there," and signifies pointing out some 
object and delighting in it. For this reason, 
perhaps, some adopt it as the word for father, 
calling him "daddy." " Na-na," another early 
word, stands for protest and refusal, and in this 
sense it may be found in almost every language. 
It is, of course, our own word " no." 

FIRST SOUNDS 

Verbs predominate with young babies and with 
primitive peoples. This is because they signify 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 233 

actions, and action is the chief thing desired. 
Probably the first sentences consisted of one 
word each. During this first year all the vowels 
appear, the consonants coming later, according to 
the order of the difficulty. Tracy says that the 
order of the appearance of letters is as follows : 

by py my ky dy Wy Oy ky <ly £, », /, /, <?, Sy Chygyjy Sky Vy 

thy /, r. 

FLEXIBILITY OF SPEECH ORGANS 

As the vocal organs form habits they become 
less flexible. Therefore it is of the utmost im- 
portance that children should be taught to enun- 
ciate correctly in the very beginning. Mothers 
often sin in this respect through their delight 
in the baby's speech, which seems to them so 
charming. They love all the baby's ways, all 
the evidences of youth and immaturity, and in 
the gratification of their own delight they quite 
forget the child's welfare. For, before he be- 
comes a man, he has with considerable difficulty 
to unlearn all these inaccurate expressions which 
she has helped to build deep into his habits of 
thinking and acting. 



234 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

In his first use of words, the child, whose 
ideas are largely in excess of his vocabulary, uses 
each word to cover too much territory. 



BLANKET WORDS 



cf Thus, Romanes gives the case of a child who 
saw a duck on the water and called it f quack/ 
After that he called all birds and insects c quack/ 
and also all liquids. Still later, he saw an eagle 
on a piece of money and called it 'quack' again. 
Lindner's daughter, when asking for an apple, 
was taught to say c apple,' and thereafter used 
the word as meaning eat. Another child used 
the word c ta-ta ' to say good-by ; then when 
anything was taken away ; then for the blow- 
ing out of a light. Still another used c hat ' for 
anything put on his head, including a comb 
and brush. Dipping bread in gravy is called 
a c bath.' The palate is the c teeth roof; the 
road is the c go ' ; the star is the c eye ' ; all 
metals are c keys/ etc. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 235 

DEFINITE MEANINGS 

" Later, he tries to limit his words and make 
their meaning more definite. Thus Darwin's 
son called all food c mum.' Then, later, when 
he wished to say sugar, he called it c shu-mum ' ; 
and when he needed to say licorice he called it 
' black-shu-mum.' " (Tanner.) 

Such limitations of the meanings of words, 
making each word fit more exactly the thought 
which it expresses, is another tremendous step 
in the acquisition of speech. As soon as he 
has taken this step he has learned the prin- 
ciple on which speech must be adapted to the 
needs of thought, and it is merely a question 
of how to apply the principle in the innumer- 
able instances which arise every day. The ap- 
plication, of course, varies with the individual 
child, and the results are often as amusing as 
they are instructive. 

DESIRE TO COMMUNICATE 

The next step is to discover that nor only 
must he make his words fit his own thought, 



236 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

but he must make them fit the thought of other 
people, because his desire is not only to express 
his thought, but to communicate it. In order to 
accomplish this, he must use as far as possible the 
words which other people have agreed upon. 
As soon as this idea becomes perfectly clear to 
him he imitates more carefully than before. He 
drops his invented language and uses the con- 
ventional forms which those about him use. 
That is, if he is an English baby he uses English 
words, and if he is a French baby, brought up by 
English-speaking people, he will also use English 
words. It is not the specific language which is 
inherited by children, but merely the faculty of 
using speech and of adapting it to the customs 
of those among whom he finds himself. 

MOTHER AS ASSISTANT 

In this last and most difficult process the 
mother can be of the greatest assistance to the 
child. She can show him both by example and 
by direct speech what the accepted usage is, and 
lead him from the beginning to speak accurately. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 237 

Of so much importance is this early training that 
no amount of teaching at school or even in 
college can in later years entirely overcome early 
incorrect habits of speech. A child who says 
cc ain't " for the first two or three years of his life 
will say it all the rest of his life whenever he is 
off guard, and thereby proclaim to all observers 
the character of the speech that was about him in 
his infancy. College theses showing considerable 
brilliancy of thought and observation neverthe- 
less often contain blunders in grammar and idiom 
due to this lack of early training. 

EXTENT OF VOCABULARY 

As for the number of words which children 
use at the close of the first year of life, thev, of 
course, vary greatly with the aptitude of the 
children themselves, and with the amount of 
speech which they have been encouraged to use. 
Tracy says that on an average they can speak 
about ten words. The first sentence appears 
from the seventeenth to the twenty-third month. 
There is, however, no particular importance to be 



238 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

attached to the failure of a child to come up to 
this level of acquirement. He may simply be 
brighter in other respects than in respect to lan- 
guage ; or he may be naturally slow of devel- 
opment in all directions ; or he may be laying 
such broad foundations for an unusually large and 
commodious structure of character that he cannot 
arrive at speech as soon as do children of a 
slighter personality. Here again we must repeat 
the warning against hurrying him. If he is urged 
too far in speech making, he may be found to 
neglect some other equally important elements of 
growth. 

OTHER ACCOMPLISHMENTS 

Our baby has done great deeds in this one 
year. In the first place he has progressed from 
a weight of six and one half pounds to about 
twenty pounds. His head at birth was much 
larger in proportion to the body than it now is ; 
a fact signifying, of course, that his body has 
made a considerable growth. The skull plates on 
his head have grown together so that there is no 
longer an open spot, although many babies' heads 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 239 

are still somewhat soft and sensitive. His ears 
and eyes, which were unfinished at birth, have 
now reached almost a complete development. 
This is especially true of his ear, which seems to 
distinguish sounds almost as perfectly at the end 
of one year's growth as later in life. Of course, 
this does not mean that it has reached the sensi- 
tiveness of that of a trained musician, but that it 
has become able to distinguish sounds for all 
ordinary purposes. The eye can now take a 
sharp and clear impression, something like a 
photographic plate, but it is not yet able to dis- 
tinguish color clearly. The best observers say 
that blue, violet, and green continue to look alike 
to a child until somewhere about the third year. 

FROM SPINE TO CEREBRUM 

The new-born babe we have found to be a 
spinal animal, relying chiefly on the functions of 
the spinal cord. Many of the higher brain 
centers do not exist at all, and those that do 
exist are incomplete. But by the end of the first 
year the baby has made rapid growth in his 
cerebral regions, and all the higher centers, such 



240 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

as those of speech and causation, are well de- 
veloped and in active use. 

At first the baby had " no language but a 
cry." During the first year we have seen this 
cry grow into speech. In the beginning it was 
very easy to mistake him ; in fact, most of the 
time his attendants did not know what he was 
crying about. But by the end of the first year 
he can make his wants clearly known, and is 
sometimes even able to gratify them himself. 

TEETH AND CHANGE OF FOOD 

He has four teeth, with which he can bite, and 
his ability to digest varied foods has increased 
considerably ; in fact, now he needs some ad- 
dition to his mother's milk, and we have begun 
to give him the extra food suggested in the last 
chapter. The intervals between meals have 
steadily increased. During the first month he 
seemed to be eating almost all the time, because 
he had to be fed every two hours, and it took 
sometimes almost an hour to feed him ; but now 
he needs food only every four or five hours. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 241 

He ought to have a good deal of hair by this 
time. If he was born with a crop of it, it has all 
fallen out and been replaced by less soft but 
more manageable hair. 

His little nose was perfectly immobile for the 
first six months, but in the seventh month he 
began to take possession of it, and now he can 
move it most expressively. 

SLEEP 

He has learned to sleep longer hours, and to 
stay awake longer hours. His increasing intel- 
lectual interest has led to this result. He often 
finds the world about him so full of thrilling 
experiences that he does not go to sleep until 
driven to it by pure exhaustion. 

The second month we noted with joy his first 
conscious smile. This has broadened into a 
joyous crow, and has now become a full human 
laugh. 

CONTROL OF HEAD 

He could not look around in the beginning, 

but now he can. We remember that this effort 

R 



242 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

to command the body in order to satisfy an intel- 
lectual hunger is regarded as one of the first 
signs of a truly human intellectual life. He 
turns his head not because he has any bodily 
want which that motion will satisfy, but because 
he must examine more closely the cause of 
certain sounds and sights which reach him. It 
took him months before he could manage to hold 
his head up, but he has now accomplished this 
feat, which is beyond the power of any animal, 
even the strongest. 

EXPERIMENTING 

We have seen him experimenting in all sorts 
of ways to get acquainted with his own body. 
In the early months he did not know why he 
could not suck his fist and at the same time wave 
it around in the air. In order to solve this 
problem we have seen him studying his hands 
and feet for hours. But now that he is a year 
old he knows as well as you do that his hands 
and feet are attached to himself, and that he is, 
to a large extent, master of their motions. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 243 

It took him a still longer time to discover 
that his own body was distinct from other 
bodies about him. He made the discovery 
only in the tenth month by means of a number 
of repeated experiments. But now this knowl- 
edge is his for life. 

HEARING 

From being either deaf at birth or very 
unheedful of sounds he has become very sensi- 
tive to all noises. He has learned to manage 
his eyes, which originally rolled about in the 
most extraordinary manner, one eye looking 
out at the left while the other looked out to 
the right, one looking up and the other down, 
and one open and the other shut, and so on, 
in the most uncomfortable fashion. Only by 
repeated efforts to see, and conscious effort to 
focus both eyes clearly upon an object in which 
his mind is interested, has he learned to use 
his eyes as you and I use them. 



244 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

SEEING 

At first he saw all faces as mere moving disks 
of light, but by degrees he has learned to dis- 
tinguish the shadows upon this round light 
surface so perfectly that he knows the faces of 
strangers from those that are familiar to him, 
and can even distinguish his mother's face and 
his father's from other familiar faces. 

MOVING 

He is so far master of the large muscles of 
his body that he, who could not be safely left 
unwatched in his crib, can now turn himself 
over. 

CONTROL OF HANDS 

As to the smaller muscles of his hands, how 
perfectly he has come to control them ! He 
grasps with intention at all sorts of objects, and 
by learning to put his thumb opposite his fin- 
gers — a trick which no monkey or baby can 
perform — he has made of his hands the most 
perfect machine ever known — a machine which 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 245 

is the foundation model for all the complicated 
engines in use in the great factories of to-day. 
The great machines are merely enlarged hands 
that are made by hands, and for hands, and 
after the model of hands. 

He has discovered by long and patient experi- 
ment that objects will fall to the ground. 

He has taught himself to sit alone. 

He can creep. 

He can stand. 

He can walk. 

EXPRESSION AND REPRESSION 

Not only has he learned to express his desires 
and his various emotions, but he is just begin- 
ning to know how to suppress an expression. 
Think what this means ! At first he could not 
in any other way than by vague crying tell us 
what he wanted or how he felt. Now he can 
tell, and it has taken him almost a year of hard, 
patient work to manage it. But as soon as he 
learns how to tell with emphasis he is required 
to put a check upon this expression, and bring 



246 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

it within bounds. So that if, for instance, he 
wants something very badly indeed, and pro- 
ceeds to scream for it and to work every muscle 
in his body in the effort to get it, in the very 
height of this wholly successful endeavor he is 
obliged to quiet down and hold himself in ; or, 
as we say, not realizing the full force of our 
words, he has to learn to control his temper. 
This highest and most difficult function of mind 
he only begins to put into action by the close of 
the first year. 

VOLUNTARY MOTIONS 

In the first few months he could not will his 
movements at all. Now he is so far able to 
will his movements that he can carry his body 
about from place to place, and can help himself 
to things which he wants, and is master of a 
gesture language. Even the fine muscles of 
his face are under his control, so that he can 
and does express by the most varied play of 
features the more delicate emotions which surge 
through him. 

From involuntary noises and gestures he 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 247 

rises to make voluntary noises by which he 
intends to convey a knowledge of his state. In 
the next step he finds himself able to make 
these noises even when he is not in a particular 
state of mind, but only in imitation of others 
who make them to him. This is significant of 
his desire to be at one with the persons about 
him, and not only to communicate to them his 
own state of mind but to understand theirs. 
Therefore his next step after imitation is to 
conform his own expressions to the expressions 
commonly in use about him. That is, he begins 
to adopt the language of his family. He begins 
to speak. 

GROWTH 

During the first three years of his life he 
makes half of his growth ; that is, if at three 
years old, he measures two feet, eight inches, 
he will, when full grown, measure about five 
feet, four inches. In the same way he acquires 
during these first three years a full half of the 
body of knowledge which will be his in his 
prime. That is, a learned man o\ seventy has 



248 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

only made, in sixty-seven years, the same in- 
tellectual advance that he made during his first 
three years. 

Just think a minute ! During these first 
years the child has laid the foundation for 
mastery of his body, for knowledge of the 
surrounding world of nature and of human 
beings, and of his relation to them. All his 
after knowledge is but a final analysis, or a 
fuller carrying out of these fundamental experi- 
ences. 

Of these three years the first year is the 
most important, for in that year all these activ- 
ities have their beginning. It is no wonder 
that books are written about it ; and that scien- 
tific men have found it worth their concentrated 
attention. It is time that mothers knew the 
importance of it, and that clear-eyed knowledge, 
rather than intuition and tradition, should guide 
their actions. For to the mother, almost to the 
exclusion of the rest of the world, the child is 
intrusted during this wonderful period. 



APPENDIX 
CARE OF THE EYES OF THE NEW-BORN 

Sometimes the swelling and mattering and 
soreness of a new baby's eyes are the result of 
a cold ; but again, such symptoms often show 
the presence of a terribly destructive disease 
called ophthalmia neonatorum ; and not even a 
physician can tell the one thing from the other. 
If it is just a cold, the baby will get well with 
ordinary care. If it is ophthalmia, he will 
grow worse. The eyes will stick together 
morning after morning ; they will run matter ; 
the baby will wilt and pine and fret ; then, all 
of a sudden, the iris will gush out — and the 
child will be blind ! 

There is a widespread belief that this dan- 
gerous disease can arise only when the child 
has been exposed to a certain infection. But 
this is not true. The child of a sound and 
healthy father and mother may have it, if ex- 
posed to the common accidents of birth. 

249 



250 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

The safe thing to do — and progressive physi- 
cians do it — is to place a single drop of a 
weak solution of nitrate of silver — two per cent 
— into the eye as soon as the baby is born. 
If this is done, there is seldom any further 
trouble. This is the routine practice in all 
good hospitals. 

But if this precaution has been omitted and 
the baby's eyes begin to be sore, waste no 
time, but take active measures at once. First, 
wash the eyes, several times a day if necessary. 
Do not allow the pus to accumulate. As the 
washing is troublesome to the child, he will 
struggle to get away from it. To prevent this, 
lay him on a long towel or shawl, and bind 
this firmly around him, so that he cannot 
move. Then take soft, clean old rags — pieces 
of old linen handkerchiefs are just right — and 
wash the eyes very gently with tepid water, 
or, better yet, with tepid milk and water. Be 
sure that the milk, the water, the rags, and your 
own hands are all scrupulously clean ! Dirt is 
clear poison in such a case. 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 251 

Having washed the eyes, brush the edges of 
the lids with a little plain vaseline or thick, 
sweet cream, to keep the lids from sticking 
together. Be sure always to do this just be- 
fore putting the baby to sleep, so that his 
eyes will not be stuck together when he wakes 
up. 

Throw away every rag you use, immediately 
after using it. It is best to burn it. Scald 
out the basin, and wash your hands with care, 
for this is a very infectious disease. The least 
particle of matter on your fingers or a towel 
will be enough to give you or some one else 
the same trouble. 

So much for cleanliness. The remedial treat- 
ment consists in the use of a solution of alum 
— six grains to one ounce of distilled water. 
Have your druggist prepare it for you, and, 
after washing the eyes as just directed, place 
one drop between the lids with a dropper. 
This can be had for five cents at the drug 
store. Do not let the dropper itself touch the 
eyes or touch any of the cloths you have ! 



252 THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 

using, or, at the next treatment, you will be 
putting more poison into the poor, sick little 
eyes. 

These measures are usually sufficient. If 
they are not, and the disease seems to be 
gaining, get a two per cent solution of nitrate 
of silver and drop just one drop into each eye. 
Lay a folded handkerchief wet with cold water 
upon the eyes, to relieve the burning that fol- 
lows the use of this remedy. The nitrate of 
silver reenforces the action of the alum water. 
One application is usually sufficient. After 
that you may return to the alum water again. 

There is absolutely no danger in this treat- 
ment, if you adhere strictly to the above rules ; 
and you may save your child from a lifelong, 
terrible affliction. 

If you find that your baby has sore eyes, 
you need not leap at once to the conclusion 
that it is going to be blind. Fear is a bad 
thing. It paralyzes all your efforts. Fear is 
not necessary; for if you take the right course, 
there is nothing to fear. Terrible as this dis- 



THE MOTHER'S YEAR-BOOK 253 

ease is, it is 'preventable ; and, in its earlier 
stages, curable. 

Perhaps the trouble is only a cold, as your 
well-meaning friends will tell you ; but perhaps 
it is more. The wise thing is to be on the 
safe side. 

It won't hurt to treat a cold as if it were 
ophthalmia. Alum water and cleanliness can 
hurt no baby. But it will hurt to treat oph- 
thalmia as if it were a cold. 



INDEX 



Affection 

baby's need of it, 87. 
Ambidexterity 

arguments for and against, 66. 
Anger 

causes of, 193. 
Arms 

holding out, at 3 months, 84. 
Attention 

too much, 154. 

Baby basket, 3. 
Baby talk, 190. 
Backwardness, 72. 
Balls 

FroebePs first gift, 127. 
Barley water, 50. 
Bath 

first bath, 9. 

oil, 9. 

temperature of, 148. 

toys for, 129. 
Birth 

changes inaugurated by, 8. 

condition at, 12. 
Blindness 

at birth, 13. 
Bottle 

care of, 120. 

foods for, 48. 
Bottle-babies, 42. 
Bowels 

regulation of — by food, 50. 
Bowlegs 

at birth, 12. 

too early use of legs, 227. 
Brain centers 

at birth, 12. 

built by the exercise of will, 20S. 

Breasts 

stripping of, 26. 



Causality, 201. 
Chafing, 123. 
Changing diapers, 7. 
Climbing, 169. 
Clothes 

bed-clothes, 18. 

first clothes, 11. 

for creeping, 171, 176. 

Gertrude Suit, 28. 

out-door wraps, 5. 

short clothes, 31. 
Colic 

from wet diapers, 7. 
Contacts 

should be multiplied, 64. 
Control of bowels and bladder, 205. 
Cradle 

cold, 17. 

flat, 16. 
Creative activity, 103. 
Creeping 

clothes for, 171, 176. 

importance of, 166. 

inconvenience of, 165. 
Cries 

articulate, 187. 

of discomfort, 54. 

of hunger, 54. 

of new-born, 14. 

of pain, 54. 

significance of, 53. 
Cross-eyes, 56. 
Crowing, 116. 

Deafness 
at birth, i,;. 

importance of early recognition, 
39. 

Development 
order oi ^>cc P rogress oi the 

Month). 



255 



256 



INDEX 



Diapers 

changing, 7. 

number of, 6. 
Discipline, 89. 
Discomfort 

after birth, 16. 

causes of, 34. 

signs of, 36, 73. 
Discontent 

causes of, 75. 
Distance 

sense of, 108. 
Draughts, 153. 
Dressing the baby 

first time, 11. 

Ear 

condition at birth, 13. 
Emotions 

child's expression of, 131. 

mother's — effect of, on child, 

137. 
Eyes 
care of, at birth, 249. 
condition of, at birth, 13. 
fixation of, 79. 
motions of, 55, 56. 

Falling objects, 199. 
Fear, 181. 

as an obstacle to walking, 224. 

toward strangers, 133. 
Feelings 

unpleasant, 16. 
Fire 

teaching fear of, 66. 
Food 

artificial, 51. 

amount of, 71, 81. 

for nursing mother, 45, 46. 

for weanling, 215. 

testing suitability, 52. 

times of giving at 1 month, 25. 

times of giving at 3 months, 76. 

unaccustomed, 121. 



Fresh air 

effect on mother's milk, 46. 
Fruits and vegetables, 218. 

Gesture 

first language, 184. 

limitation of, 185. 
Grasping 

at 3 months, 69. 

at 4 months, 97. 

immediately after birth, 14. 

Hair-pulling, 105. 
Hammock 

or cradle, 18. 

out of doors in summer, 119. 
Hand 

relation to brain, 60, 61, 63. 
Head 

holding it up, 80, 95. 

raising it, 57. 

shape of, at birth, 13. 
Hearing 

at birth, 38. 

at 2 months, 56. 
Hiccough, 76. 
Hunger 

signs of, 54. 

"I" feeling 

consciousness of self, 82. 
Imitation, 96. 
Imitative sounds, 188. 
Individuality 

a struggle for, 155. 
Inhibition 

impossible at 3 months, 65. 
Insensitive areas, 35. 
Interests (outside), 106. 
Interruption 

of the baby's play, 157. 

Kiss 
baby learns to, 160. 



INDEX 



257 



Laughter 

at 1 month, 37. 

true, 160. 
Layette, 4. 
Learning to speak, 190. 

Massage, 115. 
Memory, 146. 
Milk 

aniseed tea, 47. 

care of baby's milk, 120. 

chemical imitation of mother's 
milk, 44. 

modified, for babies, 51. 

mother's, how to increase flow, 

45- 
Motion 

expressive, 179. 

reflex, 205. 

voluntary, at 3 months, 77. 
Mouth 

as a general receptacle and 
sense organ, 109. 
Movements of the eyes 

at 1 month, 37. 

at 2 months, 56. 

at 3 months, 79. 
Muscles 

activity of, 115. 

Napkins, 6. 
Nausea, 75. 
Navel 

dressing, 11. 

silk for tying, 4. 
Negative commands, 65. 
New-born baby, 1. 
Night air, 151. 
Night care, 7. 
Nipples 

artificial, no. 
Noises 

interest in, to6. 

sensitive to, 1 7S. 



Nose 

at birth, 12. 

later, 144. 
Nursing 

complete, 26. 

frequency of, 25. 

night, 27, 46. 



Oatmeal water, 50. 
Obedience 

impossibility of, 65. 
Oil rub 

after birth, 9. 
Outfit 

see Layette. 
Outside interests, 106. 



Pain 

cry of, 54, 148. 
Playing with the baby, 91. 
Playthings, 124, 126. 
Pleasure 

signs of, 36. 
Precocity, 191, 205. 
Prenatal impressions, 136. 
Preparation for the baby's ad- 
vent, 2. 
Prickly heat, 123. 
Progress of the Month 

1 month old, t,^. 

2 months old, 53. 

3 months old, 71. 

4 months old, 92. 

5 months old, 116. 

6 months old, 130. 

7 months old, [43. 

8 months old, 158. 
q months old, 1 77. 
10 months old, 100. 

1 year old, 

Punishment 

for anger, 196. 

Putting baby to sleep, re. 



258 



INDEX 



Records 

value of average, 72. 
Rocking to sleep, 19. 

Satisfaction 

signs of, 73. 
Scratching, 104. 
Screens, 152. 
Self-control, 204. 
Sensations 

unpleasant, 16. 
Sensitiveness 

to temperature, 148. 
Shoes 

for creeping, 174. 
Sighs, 145. 
Sight 

at 2 months, 55. 
Singing to sleep, 20. 
Sitting up 

against pillow at 3 months old, 

79. 

device to help baby sit up alone, 
94. 

in bath, 206. 

on mother's lap, 94. 
Skull 

condition at birth, 13. 
Sleep 

at 2 months, 58. 

at 3 months, 76. 

at 4 months, 99. 

at 5 months, 117. 

at 6 months, 134. 
Smell 

sense of, 39. 
Smiles, 53. 
Soothers 

see Artificial Nipples. 
Sounds 

imitative, 188. 
Spatting hands, 65, 196. 
Speech 

development of — 
at 3 months, 83. 



at 4 months, 98. 
at 6 months, 134. 
at 7 months, 147. 
at 8 months, 162. 
at 9 months, 180. 
at 10 months, 187, 207. 
at 1 year, 230. 
flexibility of speech organs, 

2 33- 
Squint, 37, 56. 
Standing alone, 183. 
Sterilizing 

bottles and nipples, 121. 
Strangers 

astonishment at, 133. 

fear of, 133. 
Sucking fist, 59. 
Suffocation 

helpless against, at 3 months, 
78. 
Suggestibility 

greatest at waking and going to 
sleep, 21. 
Swinging cradle or hammock, 19. 

Tantrums, 194. 
Tearing paper, 103, 204. 
Tears, 53. 
Teeth, 209. 

the first tooth, 140. 

upper front teeth, 183. 
Temper 

causes of, 192. 

cures for, 199. 

is it true temper, 192? 
Temperature 

of bottle, 150. 

of cradle, 17. 

of first bath, 9. 

of room at birth, 8. 
Thumb-sucking, 113. 
Touch 

at 2 months, 55. 

importance of, 64. 

sense of, 115. 



INDEX 



*S9 



Toys, 124. 




Water 


for the bath, 129. 




drink of, for baby, 
Weaning, 210. 


Vomiting, 75. 




time of, 220. 
Weight 

at birth, 12. 


Walking 




1 month old, 40. 


date of, 226. 




2 months old, 58. 


learning to, 189, 207, 


222. 


3 months old, 81. 


with the baby, 21. 




4 months old, 100. 


Warmth 




5 months old, 117. 


and growth, 18. 




6 months old, 134. 


first great necessity 


for new- 


9 months old, 183. 


born, 11. 




10 months old, 209. 



27. 



MAY 11 J908 



